Advantage who? Navratilova and Shriver make the case for Andreeva and Svitolina at the FAGE WTA Finals
INDIAN WELLS, Calif. -- With one day left at the FAGE WTA Finals, the great unanswered question is whether anyone can take a set off Mirra Andreeva. Jessica Pegula had her chance on Saturday, building a 3-1 lead in the second set that lasted about as long as it took to put it on the scoreboard.
Andreeva finished the match in two sets, as she has all week, and has conceded just 18 games across four matches in her debut here. That’s four and a half per match, if you’re doing the math.
Should she win in two sets again on Sunday, she will join Chris Evert and Serena Williams as the only players to win the WTA Finals in their first appearance without dropping a set. Evert accomplished it at the inaugural edition in 1972. Williams won her first three matches in straight sets in 2001 and then collected the title by walkover.
FAGE WTA Finals championship matches will simulcast for free on Tennis Channel 2
The player who gets one more shot at Andreeva is the same one who got the first. Elina Svitolina lost their opener 6-4, 6-0, a drubbing that might make Andreeva seem like the obvious pick for Sunday.
Then again, the first match has been a less reliable guide to the second than you might think. Since round-robin play returned in 2003, seven pairs have met in group play and again in the final, and four times the player who lost the first match won the title. See the full breakdown in this article.
There’s also the matter of the three matches Svitolina has played since that opener, each a little more emphatic than the last. She came from a set down against Karolina Muchova, took the third set 6-1 against Aryna Sabalenka and gave up only three games against Linda Noskova. That puts her in a third final in as many WTA Finals appearances.
So can Svitolina turn that opening loss into a second WTA Finals title? We put the question to arguably the most prolific doubles team in tennis history. Martina Navratilova and Pam Shriver won 10 WTA Finals doubles titles together, but for Sunday’s final, they’re on opposite sides.
Advantage, Andreeva
What’s at stake: At 19, Andreeva is the youngest WTA Finals finalist since Maria Sharapova in 2004. Sunday will be her sixth final of the season, tying World No. 1 Elena Rybakina for the tour lead, and she comes in with a 2-1 edge over Svitolina. Both of those wins came at Indian Wells, the first on the way to the title here last year and the second in group play this week.
Navratilova’s take: “She’s just really confident right now. She’s hit her sweet spot, and maybe playing back-to-back matches helps because you’ve built up that momentum and you can still feel it. She looks really sharp. It’s hard to find an opening against her because she’s serving big and mixing it up. She hits a 90 mph serve wide with a lot of slice, and then she hits 115 down the T. It really spreads the court, particularly in the deuce court.
“It’s hard to get into her service games, and then she jumps on your second serve. So maybe you take a little off your first serve just to get it in. She knows exactly what she wants to do, and she has the confidence to execute. And I still feel like she’s not redlining it on serve. She’s still growing into her body.
“What impressed me was when she was down 4-1 in the first set against Sabalenka. I thought she was going to lose that set, and she didn’t. She made Sabalenka look silly, and that’s not easy. She’s peaking at the right time.”
Advantage, Svitolina
What’s at stake: Svitolina is playing for her second WTA Finals title seven years after her last appearance in the championship match. At 32, she’s the oldest finalist since Venus Williams in 2017, and her win over Linda Noskova gave her a tour-leading 11 Top 10 wins this season, matching her career high. One of those wins came against Andreeva at the Australian Open, so she has a match of her own to draw on if Sunday starts to feel like their opener.
Shriver’s take: “Svitolina’s won it before. In the semifinals, where obviously her opponent Noskova wasn’t able to play her best tennis, Svitolina showed why she’s played her best tennis since coming back from maternity leave. Her forehand was super aggressive, and her serve is so much more improved. Svitolina doesn’t have the holes in her game that she used to have, which were one of the weaker second serves in the game and a forehand that couldn’t hurt you. She’s a much more well-rounded player than she was in her first career.
“The other thing is Svitolina, like so many great players, is compartmentalizing and using the tennis court as her safe haven, where she focuses and leaves the storms off court. She goes into hyper-focus mode. The other thing I noticed about Svitolina today, or was reminded of, is that she is one of the best anticipators of the ball. She reads the play beautifully.”
