On Tuesday, the last of the 128 women assembled for the 2024 Australian Open sprint into their first-round singles matches.

With the four leading favorites already dominating 2024 and some marquee players returning after long breaks, this tournament is particularly tasty. But take a look at the draw’s top four lines. You can’t make this stuff up:

  1. Iga Swiatek
  2. Sofia Kenin
  3. Danielle Collins
  4. Angelique Kerber

Swiatek, of course, is the Hologic WTA Tour’s top-ranked player with four Grand Slam titles at the age of 22. Kenin won the 2020 Australian Open at 21. Collins’ greatest triumph was reaching the final here two years ago. Kerber? After giving birth to daughter Liana, the 2016 Australian Open champion (and three-time major winner) is back at the age of 35.

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It hasn’t got a ton of traction, but Swiatek is operating with a 16-match win streak, the second longest of her career. She finished 2023 by winning 11 straight in Beijing and Cancun, which brought back the No.1 ranking. Then it was five more in recent United Cup play -- against top players.

While Swiatek owns three Roland Garros crowns and another at the US Open, she has never been past the semifinals in Melbourne. That happened in 2022, and it was Collins who knocked her out in straight sets.

Australian Open: Scores | Draws | Order of play

“When you are a defending champion, obviously there is something else to the tournament,” Swiatek said at the United Cup. “I feel like I can kind of take it easy. I haven’t won Australian Open yet, so I can only look forward and try to achieve my goals.

“I’ll focus on the first matches to get into the rhythm and to just see what I learned during the preseason and how I can just, yeah, put it into matches.”

Winning the US Open proved she could win a Grand Slam played on hard courts, but the surface in Melbourne seems more conducive to the big-serving games of Aryna Sabalenka and Elena Rybakina, last year’s finalists. Swiatek is employing a new-look serve this year, hoping the more compact motion will hold up better under stress.

For Kenin, Australia was the scene of her finest moment. She won in Melbourne just before the global pandemic took hold and, at the end of a fractured season, backing up that achievement by reaching the final at Roland Garros, which was moved to September. Kenin lost to Swiatek 6-4, 6-1, and it’s the only time they’ve played, before or since.

Dogged by injuries and the doubts that come with them, Kenin’s record since that final is 38-42. The most recent defeat came in her first match in Brisbane, to Arina Rodionova in two tight sets.

“It kind of strikes me sometimes that my first Grand Slam final was against Sofia and now we’re playing in the first round,” Swiatek said. “It’s pretty weird. That’s how our life journeys kind of went apart. 

“I know she’s been playing some solid tennis. It’s not going to be easy.”

That second match, featuring 30-somethings Collins and Kerber, looks like a wash. Collins won at the 2019 Australian Open, and Kerber was a winner at 2018 Eastbourne.  

Collins split her first two matches in Brisbane, while Kerber’s comeback from a pregnancy leave against elite players at the United Cup saw her lose four of five matches. 

“She hits the ball very hard,” Kerber said of Collins. “I don’t know if I will find my rhythm, to be honest. Yeah, it is how it is. It is my first real tournament. For me being here, I am trying to play as good as I can and to see how far I can go.”

The wonderful payoff? The winners of these two top-of-the-draw matches play each other in the second round.

Tough opener for a leading favorite

No.3 seed Elena Rybakina, has been anointed a slight favorite for the title by Martina Navratilova. Rybakina reached the final Down Here last year, losing to Aryna Sabalenka. She avenged that loss in brutal fashion, 6-0, 6-3, in the recent Brisbane final.

Rybakina also played last week in Adelaide but may have done herself a favor by losing to Ekaterina Alexandrova in the quarterfinals. Her serve is a huge asset on this court, but she’s got a difficult assignment in Karolina Pliskova, a former World No.1. They’ve met three times, with Rybakina winning all of them in straight sets.

In the crucible of tiebreaks, no one has been more clutch. Rybakina won a tour-high 16 extra sessions last year. One more tidbit: Rybakina had the most aces last year in Melbourne (54); the only time that was surpassed in a single tournament in 2023 … was Rybakina (69) in Miami.

Thunder Down Under

No one enjoys playing in Australia more than Victoria Azarenka. She was the last woman to win back-to-back titles in Melbourne (2012-13) and, at 34 years old and a mother of a 7-year-old son, is still an extremely viable player. Last week, she reached the semifinals in Brisbane.

A year ago here, she blew through to the semis, beating Kenin, Madison Keys and World No.3 Jessica Pegula in the process. Azarenka and Lesia Tsurenko are the oldest seeds in the draw. The first match is against Camila Giorgi. The two split four previous contests.

First Slam in a year

After winning the 2021 US Open, Emma Raducanu felt like she was “playing with a backpack of rocks.”

Now after surgeries to both wrists and an ankle ended her 2023 season in April, she says she’s fit and in a far better place. This is her first major since losing here in the second round a year ago. First up: Shelby Rogers, a player one decade older.

Raducanu played a spirited match against No.2 seed Elina Svitolina in Brisbane -- two of the three sets went to tiebreaks. Nevertheless, she’s tempering great expectations.

“I think that regardless of how good I may feel on the court on a particular day or in practice,” she said, “I think to get that level of consistency is going to require more time.”

Raducanu won her only previous match against Rogers 6-2, 6-1, on her way to the Open title in 2021.

Schedule of play

ROD LAVER ARENA
Day session 
Iga Swiatek [1] vs. Sofia Kenin
Holger Rune [8] vs. Yoshihito Nishioka

Night session 
Elena Rybakina [3] vs. Karolina Pliskova
Richard Gasquet vs. Carlos Alcaraz [2]

MARGARET COURT ARENA
Day session 
Albert Ramos-Vinolas vs. Casper Ruud [11]
Camila Giorgi vs. Victoria Azarenka [18]

Night session 
Alexander Zverev [6] vs. Dominik Koepfer
Rebecca Marino vs. Jessica Pegula [5]

JOHN CAIN ARENA
Day session
Sloane Stephens vs. Olivia Gadecki
Grigor Dimitrov [13] vs. Marton Fucsovics

Night session 
Sebastian Ofner vs. Thanasi Kokkinakis
Petra Martic vs. Ajla Tomljanovic

KIA ARENA
Peyton Stearns vs. Daria Kasatkina [14]
Max Purcell vs. Mate Valkusz
Tommy Paul [14] vs. Gregoire Barrere
Qinwen Zheng [12] vs. Ashlyn Krueger

1573 ARENA
Cameron Norrie [19] vs. Juan Pablo Varillas
Danielle Collins vs. Angelique Kerber
Mackenzie McDonald vs. Juncheng Shang
Emma Raducanu vs. Shelby Rogers