In two weeks’ time, the best women’s tennis players in the world will descend on Melbourne for the Australian Open, the first Grand Slam tournament of the season and the first tennis milestone for 2025.
The WTA Tour is intriguingly poised, as world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka and world No. 2 Iga Swiatek prepare to resume their duel for supremacy with a resurgent Coco Gauff and Elena Rybakina ready to make a duet a quartet. Olympic gold medalist Zheng Qinwen, two-time Grand Slam finalist Jasmine Paolini and U.S. Open semifinalist Emma Navarro are looking to build on break-out seasons as Ons Jabeur makes her comeback. And, after its first Tour Finals in Saudi Arabia, the WTA and other figureheads will again reckon with the way inequity affects women in tennis and what it can do better.
The Athletic’s tennis writers, Matthew Futterman and Charlie Eccleshare, outline the biggest women’s tennis storylines for the 2025 season.
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2025 tennis mailbag: The state of tennis and players to watch this season
What now for the Swiatek vs. Sabalenka rivalry?
In quality terms, there was no better WTA match than Iga Swiatek’s 7-5, 4-6, 7-6 (7) win over Aryna Sabalenka in the Madrid Open final in May. Their duel at the top of the rankings was an interesting sub-plot throughout 2024, which…
