Our tennis man Andy Schooler picks out his best bets for the 2024 WTA Tour season, which gets under way on December 29, including 7/1 and 14/1 shots.
Tennis betting tips: 2024 ATP Tour season
1pt Coco Gauff to be year-end number one at 14/1 (bet365)
1pt Elina Svitolina to finish in the top eight at 7/1 (Sky Bet)
3pts Peyton Stearns to finish in the top 50 at 22/25 (Unibet, BetUK)
Year-end world number one
It’s rare that the current world number one doesn’t go off a firm favourite in this market.
The layers look back at the year, see how well said player has performed to reach the top-end of the game and conclude she’s there to stay.
It’s easy to see how it happens and it’s certainly not hard to see why Iga Swiatek is going off 4/7 this time around.
When on her game, the Pole is undoubtedly the world’s best player – we saw that at the season-ending WTA Finals where she dismantled first Aryna Sabalenka and then Jessica Pegula in the knockout stage to claim the title.
But Swiatek didn’t hit those heights on a regular basis in 2023 and she didn’t dominate as she had done in the previous season.
Swiatek won just one Grand Slam title in 2023 – on her favoured clay – and didn’t go beyond the last eight at any of the other majors.
That left her position as number one vulnerable and the race for the year-end top spot went to the very final match of the season with Swiatek clinching it with her thrashing of Pegula.
That was a bitter pill to swallow for this column – we had Sabalenka at 20/1 and she was the player pipped at the post.
The player who looks to have the potential to challenge at a big price 12 months on is COCO GAUFF, who is out at 14/1.
Still a teenager, Gauff made a big breakthrough with September’s victory at the US Open – tipped on these pages at 8/1 – and she should be approaching the new campaign with real confidence.
That was her fourth title of the year. All came on a hardcourt but Gauff is a player happy on other surfaces. Indeed, she said victory in New York came as something of a surprise.
“I always thought it (a Grand Slam title) would have been Roland Garros, because all my best results have been on clay,” she explained.
Gauff is also no mug on grass, a surface Swiatek still struggles on, so I’m expecting her to pick up points on a consistent basis throughout 2024.
She’ll need to keep notching up big wins and titles if she’s to challenge Swiatek for the number one ranking but with a good serve, excellent backhand and a forehand which really improved once Brad Gilbert joined her coaching set-up in the summer, Gauff looks to have the tools to keep on climbing in 2024.
To finish in the top eight
For those who like their big prices, ELINA SVITOLINA looks worth a punt in this market, one which effectively predicts which players will be attending the end-of-season WTA Finals.
Sky Bet have the top eight of last season all at odds-on but it’s rare for a season ‘repeat’ and you’d expect someone to force their way in.
Maria Sakkari, who finished ninth in the year-long rankings ‘race’ last season and duly played at the WTA Finals when Karolina Muchova withdrew injured, is considered the most likely to force her way in, ahead of Barbora Krejcikova. The duo are evens and 11/8 respectively.
However, I think it could pay to look further down the market and back a player who really shone at times in 2023.
Svitolina returned to the tour just months after giving birth to daughter Skai and played some great tennis, going 5-3 against top-20 players – a cracking effort given her time away from the court.
The Ukrainian won on clay in Strasbourg, then reached the Roland Garros quarter-finals before a run to the last four at Wimbledon where she beat Swiatek.
After switching to the North American hardcourts, Svitolina twice pushed world number three Pegula to a final set, the second time at the US Open.
She shut down her season after that defeat and therein lies the potential problem – as a mother, Svitolina is less inclined to play a packed schedule.
That said, had she been in contention to play at those WTA Finals, she would likely have contested the Asian swing. Instead, there was the chance to rest a long-standing foot injury.
Despite playing for just five months, Svitolina still ended the year as world number 25, so the potential for improvement is clear.
This season, the former world number three should play an extra Grand Slam at the Australian Open, plus the 1000 events in Indian Wells and Miami. And that’s before we get to Asia.
In short, I’m not sure Svitolina should be out at 7/1 to finish in the top eight and will back her accordingly.
To finish in the top 50
In terms of rising starts on the WTA Tour, all the pre-season talk seems to be about Mirra Andreeva, the Russian 16-year-old who cracked the top 50 in 2023.
Many feel the sky is the limit but, as I mentioned in my Grand Slam ante-post preview, there are a lot of silly prices about regarding the impact she can make in the forthcoming season.
This is really where the hard work starts and competing with the true elite has proved problematic for many in Andreeva’s shoes over the years.
It’s certainly worth considering who else might shine in 2024 and bid to find a bet regarding their chances and the woman I like the look of is PEYTON STEARNS.
The American has a major weapon in her forehand and looks destined to climb higher than her current ranking position of 49th.
I was therefore surprised to see her up at just shy of even money to finish in the top 50 again.
The former college star made her first WTA final in 2023 and, notably, produced some of her best tennis at the Slams, making the third round at Roland Garros and the fourth round of the US Open.
Her efforts saw her called up for the USA’s Billie Jean King Cup team and that experience should serve her well going forward.
This will be her first full season on the WTA Tour – she missed the Australian Open at the start of last season and was playing on the ITF World Tour at the time.
She has admitted that playing at the Slams later in the year put her well ahead of her career schedule and that experience should serve her well in 2024.
Posted at 1630 GMT on 21/12/23
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