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What an incredible two weeks it has been on the WTA Tour. The third Grand Slam of the year has been played, which of course, was the Wimbledon Championships. And since this event ran over the course of two weeks, there was no WTA rankings update to share with you last week. This is because the tournament itself covered a two-week period, and points from the event have subsequently been accumulated to go on today – Monday, July 17th.
However, while all eyes were naturally on Wimbledon, this wasn’t the only event that contributed to the WTA rankings adjustments today. There were actually two additional events taking place over the previous week too. These include two WTA 125 events played in France and Sweden, respectively. And because these tournaments reached their conclusions on July 15th and 16th, the points from these events fall into the updates for this week.
Then again, the points from these two tournaments obviously don’t quite match the points that were available for Wimbledon 2023, as this was a Grand Slam event. Anyway, that’s all you need to know regarding the preview ahead of the WTA rankings updates this week. So now, let’s get into the juicy details to see who has moved where.
WTA Rankings Updates – Week Commencing July 17th
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With so many points available for Wimbledon, this has enabled a handful of players to make a significant leap up the WTA rankings. Then again, not everybody was able to take advantage of the fact that Wimbledon didn’t have any rankings points from last year. This means that players had zero points to lose and everything to gain, yet some made it count far more than others. As always, I’ll begin by running through the players who took full advantage before looking at the players who didn’t quite capitalize on this fantastic opportunity.
The Week’s Biggest Climbers – Andreeva, Svitolina, and Kenin
If you want to know the individual that produced the most substantial leap this week out of these three players, that individual would be Elina Svitolina. The Ukrainian player was able to equal her career best at Wimbledon by reaching the semi-finals, and she produced some immense wins to reach that stage. And in doing so, she is the official climber of the week thanks to a rankings jump of 49 places! This sees Svitolina secure a ranking of 27 in the world, which is quite incredible given she’s just returned to the tour since having her first child.
With this said, other than Svitolina, the second biggest climber of the week is Sofia Kenin. The young American had to come through qualifying to reach the Wimbledon main draw, meaning she had to win three matches just to make the main draw. She then took out the 7th seed in the form of Coco Gauff in the opening round, yet ultimately, she lost in the third round to Svitolina. Regardless, thanks to this performance, she has jumped 37 spots this week to enter the WTA top 100 once again, securing a new position of 91 in the world.
As for the final climber of the week, the third spot goes to Mirra Andreeva. Amazingly, at just 16 years of age, she also qualified for the main draw and made it through to the 4th round before losing to Madison Keys. To be perfectly honest, she should have beaten Keys given she was a set and 4-1 up, but she couldn’t quite cross the line to reach the Wimbledon quarter-final. Nevertheless, she racked up plenty of points and has jumped 36 rankings places to 66 in the process.
The Week’s Biggest Fallers – Noskova and Baindl
In contrast to the biggest climbers of the week that I’ve just highlighted, the rankings drop for these two players hasn’t been quite as significant. Sure, both of these individuals have unfortunately found themselves in the red this week. But to give them some comfort, they haven’t endured catastrophic rankings adjustments. Anyway, starting with the player that takes 2nd place in terms of the biggest rankings drop, that player is Kateryna Baindl of the Ukraine. She gained direct entry into the Wimbledon main draw thanks to her ranking, yet she fell at the first hurdle to Leylah Fernandez of Canada.
Therefore, since her cumulative rankings points total has dropped compared to this time last year, she has slipped 15 spots down to 100 in the world. Of course, joining Baindl in the red zone this week is Linda Noskova. This is the player who takes 1st position as the week’s biggest faller, although it was a pretty narrow contest. Noskova has fallen down the rankings by 16 positions to now find herself at 61 in the official WTA rankings. Much like Baindl, Noskova gained direct entry into the Wimbledon 2023 Championships, yet she lost her opening match in three sets.
This means she also failed to maintain points based on this time last year, and other players around her in the rankings have been able to leap-frog Noskova as a result.
Top Rankings Stories – Vondrousova’s Fairytale Ending
Come on – it had to be the story of Vondrousova winning Wimbledon that made the story of the week! While I’m sure you have seen the results from the Wimbledon women’s singles tournament, you might not be aware of just how miraculous this result is. Basically, 12 months before the Wimbledon singles final, Marketa Vondrousova had her wrist in a cast. Of course, this kept her away from the tour and away from competitive tennis. Needless to say, she couldn’t have imagined that she would be winning Wimbledon just a year later.
Anyway, that’s exactly what she’s been able to do. But perhaps the most amazing element of all surrounding this story is the fact that she had never made it beyond the 2nd round of Wimbledon before. In fact, apart from making the finals of the French Open in 2019, she’d never even made it to the quarter-finals of any Grand Slam. So naturally, nobody expected this result, yet she produced a string of great performances to ultimately win Wimbledon.
And in doing so, Vondrousova has jumped 32 rankings positions to enter the WTA top 10 for the very first time in her career.
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