Race to Finish as World No.1 Heads to Flushing Meadows

Could Rafael Nadal hold on to the top spot?

After starting in ninth position at the beginning of the year, Rafa has returned to being the number one seed, at least temporarily. Roger Federer, who himself has had a wonderful year, is close on his heels. Rafa currently has a 500-point advantage over his nemesis and will be defending just the 280 points for the rest of the season.  With the year drawing to a close, the battle might as well go down to the wire at the ATP masters finals.

With one Grand Slam, two ATP World Tour Masters 1000s and the Nitto ATP Finals remaining, it will be a nail-biting finish for the top spot. Federer has said several times this year that being no.1 again is not his priority anymore. He skipped the entire clay court season this year to come back and win the crown at Wimbledon. Surely, both of them would be aiming to go the distance at the flushing meadows, and looks to be a close finish to the year, for the two veterans, who at the start of the year were underdogs.

Simona Halep or Karolina Pliskova?

Simona Halep had the chance to become the World No. 1, when she reached the finals of the French open, but was thwarted by Ostapenko in the finals. She had the opportunity again as she reached the finals at Cincinnati, but yet again she was denied by the Wimbledon champion Garbine Muguruza.

Pliskova holds a very slender lead at the top of the rankings (6390 points against Halep’s 6385 points). Will the Romanian have enough left in her tank at the end of the year, to overtake Pliskova, remains to be seen. The duos individual performances at the US open and at Singapore, will determine the outcome. However, Muguruza enters the final stages of the year as the clear favourite.

The stage is set for the showdown in men’s as well as the women’s division, and it will be important for them to perform well at the US open.