So much was going on this year--the Olympics, a couple of major retirements--it was really difficult to distill this list to ten items---though I really tried to do it--so there's a bonus eleventh subject this year, followed by a WTA top 10.
(11. The Year of Yui: If ever the phrase “always the bridesmaid, never the bride” fit someone, it would be Yui Kamigi. Until now. World number 1 Diede de Groot had defeated world number 2 Kamiji 28 times in a row until this year. Some context, of course, is required: de Groot’s year was marred by injury; she didn’t even compete at the Wheelchair Masters event (which Kamiji won). de Groot failed to defend her Paralympic gold medals, and—perhaps most significant (at least, for fans)—her 145 match win streak was broken.
Kamiji won singles gold at the Paralympics, defeating de Groot in the final. She and her partner, Manami Tanaka, also won gold in doubles when they defeated de Groot and Aniek Van Koot in the final. The Japanese star also defeated de Groot to win the 2024 British Open. (Bear in mind that de Groot's 2024 record was, as always, outstanding: She won three majors in singles, and two in doubles. The fact that Kamiji defeated her twice in one year is just as much a statement about de Groot as it is about Kamiji.)
10. This Coco stays hot: Coco Gauff didn’t win a major in singles this year, but she and Katerina Siniakova won the French Open doubles title. She also won the WTA Finals, defeating world number 1 Aryna Sabalenka in the semifinals and Olympic gold medal winner Zheng Qinwen in the final. Gauff won two other titles this year, including the WTA 1000 Beijing title. She is currently number 3 in the world.
9. Feels like old times: It had been a while since the Four Fighting Italians (Schiavone, Pennetta, Errani, and Vinci) won what used to be called Fed Cup. That amazing quartet claimed victory four times, but Italy hadn’t lifted the trophy since 2013. That changed this year, when the Italian team, powered by veteran Sara Errani and the revelatory Jasmine Paolini, won the Billie Jean King Cup. It was a great tournament, with impressive play from Great Britain and finalist Slovakia, but it was Team Italy that emerged as the champion—and that felt just right.
8. When all that glitters is gold (and silver and bronze): Zheng Qinwen’s star has beeen on the rise for a few years now, and when she made the final of the Australian Open in 2023, it rose even higher. This year, the world number 5 gained even more attention by winning an Olympic gold medal. The indomitable Donna Vekic won the silver, and Iga Swiatek won the bronze. The highlights in singles for me were seeing Vekic stand on the podium, and seeing Anna Karolina Schmiedlova come in fourth (she came so close!).
The gold medal in doubles went to—but of course!—the Italian team of Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini. The Russian team of Mirra Andreeva and Diana Shnaider won silver, and the Spanish team of Cristina Bucşa and Sara Sorrebes Tormo won the bronze.
7. A wealth of doubles: Some of us used to say that a winning team was made up of Kiki Mladenovic and Anybody. These days, that team is composed of Katerina Siniakova and Anybody. Siniakova and very longtime partner, Barbora Krejcikova, split at the end of 2023 (I’m still trying to deal with that, and am still hopeful that they’ll get back together), and since then, Siniakova hasn’t missed a beat. This year, she won tournaments with Zhang Shuai, Krejcikova, Taylor Townsend, and Coco Gauff. She won the French Open with Gauff, and then won Wimbldeon with Townsend. Siniakova and Townsend will be partners in 2025, and they are likely to be tough to beat. Siniakova is currently the number 1 doubles player in the world.
But Siniakova isn’t the only doubles player who stood out in 2024. Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini won an Olympic gold medal, and then led their team to the Billie Jean King Cup championship. Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Mertens won the Australian Open, and Lyudmyla Kichenok and Aļona Ostapenko won the U.S. Open (Mladenovic was on the runner-up team). And 2023 U.S. Open champions Gabriela Dabrowski and Erin Routliffe won the WTA Finals.
6. Sweet repeat: Last year, Aryna Sabalenka won her first major—the Australian Open. And this year, she did it again. Sabalenka defeated Barbora Krejcikova, Coco Gauff and Zheng Qinwen in the final rounds. That would be impressive enough, but there's also the fact that she didn't drop a set the entire tournament.
5. Au revoir, merci beaucoup: Alizé Cornet was such a fixture on the tour that some of us probably forgot that she would retire some day. That day occurred this year, during the French Open. I dislike the term “overachiever,” but I do acknowledge the existence of underachivers, and for me, Cornet was the biggest underahiever on the tour. She had an excess of talent, but she wasn’t able to translate that talent into big wins. Nevertheless, she could take out any elite player on a given day, and she brought the so-called “French flair” like no one since Suzanne Lenglen. Cornet was a joy to watch, and she’s also a joy to read. Unfortunately, her first novel hasn’t been translated into English, but her diary/memoir was, and it’s an extremely well-written book.
4. But who’s counting?: In 2020, Iga Switak took Paris by storm, winning the French Open without dropping a set. She lost in the quarterfinals in 2021, but in 2022, 2023 and 2024, she took home the Coupe Suzanne Lenglen. That ties her with Jusine Henin, who also won four times in Paris. Chris Evert holds the record: She won the French Open seven times.
3. A champion’s champion leaves the court: In 2021, Angie Kerber reached Wimbledon semifinals, and that got my attention like nothing else. Could she do it again? I wondered. It turned out that she couldn’t—she lost that match to eventual champion Ash Barty. Kerber had a baby and took a year and a half off. And when she returned to the tour, she held the United Cup trophy with the German team. However, in August of this year, after she lost her Olympic quarterfinal match, Kerber announced her retirement.
Commentators like to throw around the term “work ethic”—another phrase I don’t especially like—but if you want to go down that road, it would be hard to argue that Angie Kerber isn’t the absolute role model. A talented journeywoman who did everything well, the German star gradually worked her way up the rankings. Then she recognized that she wouldn’t continue to do so until she improved parts of her game. The German star then went on a mission, asking for help so that she could make those improvements. She learned to make her strengths even stronger, and she retired as a former world number 1, with three major trophies—the Australian Open, Wimbledon and the U.S. Open.
Kerber had a lethal transition game, and she perfected the Radwanska squat shot. But she will perhaps be best remembered for her inspiring fighting spirit and determination. The tougher it got, the harder Kerber worked, and it was often glorious to watch her.
2. Czechs win Wimbledon—it’s what they do: Barbora Krejcikova has had a tough time of it in the last couple of years, suffering various injuries that kept her off of the tour. (Of course, according to tennis “fans,” she “inconsistent.” Krejcikova can be inconsistent, but--in this case--multiple injuries to different parts of her body rendered her unable to play, much less win.) But she was feeling good by the time she reached London. Seeded number 31, the Czech star went about defeating the likes of Danielle Collins, Aļona Ostapenko, 2022 champion Elena Rybakina, and French Open finalist Jasmine Paolini.
Last year, Marketa Vondrousova, who had to watch from the stands in 2022 because of her chronic wrist issues, became the first unseeded player to win Wimbledon. Martina Navratilova won Wimbledon twice as a Czech citizen, Jana Novotna won it in 1998, and Petra Kvitova won it in 2011 and 2014.
1. A nice pair of bookends is always in style: Aryna Sabalenka had a great year, winning the Australian Open and two 1000 events (Wuhan and Cincinnati). In Cincinnati, she appeared to reach her hard court peak, not only winning the title, but taking out Iga Swiatek in straight sets in the semifinals. She looked like a lock for the U.S. Open title, and she didn’t disappoint. In New York, Sabalenka dropped only one set, and in the final three rounds, defeated Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen, Emma Navarro, and a very in-form Jessica Pegula. In 2023, Sabalenka reached the U.S. Open semifinals in 2022, and she was the runner-up in 2023, so--though we know that, in sports, there's really no such thing as inevitability--the Belarusian star's New York ascension did have that flavor.
Sabalenka ends the year as the number 1 player in the world, and holds the Chris Evert trophy for the first time. She was number 1 in the world for eight weeks in the fall of 2023, but did not end that year as the top-ranked player.
