Iga Swiatek is someone who never minces words when it comes to sharing an honest opinion. Earlier this year, she expressed her serious concern over the WTA’s hectic calendar comprising frequent events. Back in August, she said, “Our calendar is crazy, probably the toughest one in sports…Our schedule is crazy, and it’s getting more crazy every year, which is scary.” The former World No.1 eventually gained a lot of support as well on this matter. Now, a positive update indicates that her issues with the WTA schedule may get addressed soon.

The Pole is currently preparing for the WTA Finals in Riyadh. During a recent press conference ahead of the event, she was asked whether the authorities governing the game actively listen to players’ issues, such as the topic of scheduling. In her response, Iga Swiatek said, “Well, I feel like when I first came to WTA, it was pretty tricky. Now I think that they are listening to us much more. I’ve seen some progress in terms of the communication.”

Remember, the player had blamed a lack of proper rest after getting eliminated at an early stage of the Wimbledon event in July. She then made it clear to not make such a mistake again, appearing in successive events affected her mental stability to a greater extent. As a result, she backed out of various ATP tournaments like the Toronto Open and the entire Asian swing comprising the Wuhan Open, China Open, and the Hong Kong Open. While reiterating her thoughts on the importance of mental health, she said,

“I guess it’s all going to be about proper planning, making your own decisions kind of, no matter what’s going on with the rankings, mandatory tournaments sometimes. For sure for us as players, the priority should be our health in general.” On the other hand, the five-time Grand Slam winner did acknowledge that mandatory tournaments are part of the sport:

“It’s something that we kind of can’t take back because this is business, this is our contract, this is money,” she said. Hinting at a possible discussion with the authorities over the events, she hoped for “a good time to give some feedback and talk about it internally with WTA” at the end of this season. Furthermore, Swiatek also reflected on the new partnership with her first non-Polish trainer Wim Fissette.

Iga Swiatek hopes for a great improvement under new coach Wim Fissette

Iga recently lost the World No.1 ranking to Aryna Sabalenka last month due to her absence in the entirety of the Asian Swing. Of course, Iga would like to regain her position with an impressive performance at the WTA Finals. “Obviously, we’re both fighting for this spot. Yeah, it’s been us basically kind of over the past few years,” she said while highlighting her rivalry with the Belarusian over the last few seasons.

Going into the WTA Finals last year, Sabalenka was world No. 1, with a lead of 630 points over Swiatek. But the Pole then destroyed the field, dropping only 20 games in 10 sets. Jessica Pegula, who faced her in the final, was clear as to how Iga “clearly really wanted that ranking.” Whereas, Sabalenka’s tournament run ended in the semifinals, where she was defeated by Swiatek. Despite this, she secured 625 valuable points, but lost her No. 1 spot. Would Swiatek be able to repeat the feat this year?

Swiatek has recently announced Fissette as her coach after parting ways with Tomasz Wiktorowski last month. The Pole wants to make the most of her association with Fissette going forward, starting with WTA Finals. “Wim has some nice ideas. Honestly, for now we’ve just been preparing for this tournament and getting to know each other. The real changes, we’re going to talk about them during the off-season because that’s the proper time to do it,” she said.

Iga also mentioned that she’s not a complete player who’s perfect in her game. Thus, it’s really crucial for her to improve her tactical skills under the guidance of Wim during the off-season ahead of next year’s first major event, the Australian Open. For now, her only goal is to be in the best shape for the event in Riyadh. After all, it will be a high-stakes tournament for her. Despite the heated competition between them, Iga did confess that Aryna deserves to be the No.1 player. But she’s going to fight for taking back the throne from Sabalenka.