(Photo: Tennis Canada)
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A big WTA 1000 is over.
And given this one had some carnage to the entry list because of the Olympics, it was a great opportunity for other players to make noise.
No one took more advantage of this than Amanda Anisimova, who blazed through the draw and ended up in the final.
There are such big points gaps between the top seven players (with the exception of Coco Gauff and Aryna Sabalenka at No. 2 and No. 3) that it will take a lot to change things.
That said, Gauff is defending 1000 points this week in Cincinnati. And the way her tennis is at the moment, that will be a tough ask. Even then, though, she might only drop one spot.
For the updated WTA Tour rankings for Monday, click here.
Emma Navarro (USA): No. 15 ==========> No. 13 (Another career high for Emma Navarro, who moved through the Toronto draw to the semifinals before being corrected by Amanda Anisimova. She is the No. 11 seed in Cincinnati, and will have a tough one in the first round against Mirra Andreeva).
Diana Shnaider (RUS): No. 24 ==========> No. 20 (Welcome Shnaider to the top 20 for the first time, after a run to the Toronto semifinals. The winner of three WTA tournaments this year on three different surfaces, the 20-year-old lefty was ranked No. 108 when she went to Thailand after the Australian Open – and won the tournament. Shnaider will play Zhang Shuai in the first round in Cincinnati – notably, Shuai was due to play Leylah Fernandez in the first round in Toronto, but withdrew last minute).
Elina Svitolina (UKR): No. 34 ==========> No. 30 (Svitolina’s second-round effort in Toronto was enough to get her back into the top 30, and likely will get her seeded at the US Open. She has no points to defend as she faces a qualifier in the first round of Cincinnati).
Peyton Stearns (USA): No. 53 ==========> No. 46 (Back inside the top 50 after making the Toronto quarterfinals, Stearns has a main-draw wild card into Cincinnati and will play Paula Badosa).
Amanda Anisimova (USA): No. 132 ==========> No. 49 (Back into the top 50 as she rises more than 80 spots with her run to the Toronto final. Anisimova has been working off a protected ranking of No. 61; she won’t need it any more. Anisimova gets the special exempt into Cincinnati and will play No. 14 seed Victoria Azarenka).
Taylor Townsend (USA): No. 71 ==========> No. 53 (Into the Toronto main draw as a lucky loser, the 28-year-old made the quarterfinals and moves to a new career high. It didn’t help her this week, though, as she has to play the Cincinnati qualifying. She and Katerina Siniakova are the top seeds in the doubles draw).
Ashlyn Krueger (USA): No. 82 ==========> No. 65 (The 20-year-old American ties her career high with a run from the qualifying to the third round in Toronto. She, too, is in the Cincinnati qualifying).
Anna Bondár (HUN): No. 94 ==========> No. 79 (While Toronto was happening, there were other tournaments around the world and the 27-year-old from Hungary won the WTA 125 in Hamburg to make a nice leap in the rankings. Her career high is No. 50).
McCartney Kessler (USA): No. 110 ==========> No. 100 (Not everyone can be No. 1. But there are lots of other milestones to reach and the 25-year-old American did just that this week by winning the Landisville $100K ITF. Top 100 is a big deal; so many player get so close, and never quite make it).
Marina Stakusic (CAN): No. 160 ==========> No. 143 (Another career best for the 19-year-old after winning her first round match in Toronto against despite injuring her calf. That injury hampered her in a second-round loss to Townsend. And she lost in the first round of qualifying in Cincinnati Sunday after her agency – which also owns the WTA portion of the tournament – gave her a wild card).
Bianca Andreescu (CAN): No. 175 ==========> No. 166 (A little leap in the rankings for Andreescu, but it could have been so much more in the wide-open Toronto draw. Unfortunately she let a first-round match against the inconsistent Lesia Tsurenko slip away – big time. She, like Stakusic, gets a wild card from the Octagon agency, and will face a qualifier in the first round of Cincinnati).
Carol Zhao (CAN): No. 281 ==========> No. 264 (Zhao jumps a bit after winning a first-round match in Toronto qualifying against Kristina Mladenovic. She is playing the qualifying at a WTA 125 in Barranquilla, Colombia this week).
Danielle Collins (USA): No. 8 ==========> No. 10 (Collins didn’t play Toronto. And after she went from the qualifying to the quarterfinals last year, she was defending a lot of points. Maria Sakkari and Barbora Krejcikova, who also didn’t play, sneak ahead of her. Collins also is not playing Cincinnati. Notably, she lost to Iga Swiatek both in Montreal and in Cincinnati last summer).
Liudmila Samsonova (RUS): No. 13 ==========> No. 17 (Samsonova was defending finalist’s points from Montreal last year. She beat Siniakova, Zheng Qinwen, Sabalenka, Bencic and Rybakina – in the middle of the night – before losing to Pegula. So even though she did make the quarterfinals this year, she drops four spots).
Dayana Yastremska (UKR): No. 27 ==========> No. 34 (Yastremska, who won a WTA 125 in Poland this week last year, lost in the first round in Toronto this year and probably bumped herself out of the seeds in NY. She still has this week in Cincinnati, but starts out tough against Karolina Muchova).
Karolina Muchova (CZE): No. 30 ==========> No. 35 (A third-rounder in Toronto last year, Muchova didn’t play Toronto and also might have pushed herself out of the seeds. She meets Yastremska to kick off Cincinnati and has a draw she can work with. But she’s also defending points from the final a year ago. Then she’s defending points from a US Open semifinal – the last tournament she played before a 10-month injury absence. So this is a pretty key month for her rankings future).
Anna Blinkova (RUS): No. 68 ==========> No. 80 (Blinkova was defending second-round points but lost in the first round in Toronto. Then, she headed to Cincinnati for the qualifying – and has the brutal draw luck of getting Naomi Osaka, in her first qualifying attempt since 2018. She lost in three sets, and drops down).
Caroline Wozniacki (DEN): No. 70 ==========> No. 84 (The Woz doesn’t do qualifying, apparently. So she didn’t play Toronto and drops her points from a second round a year ago – which was her first tournament back after retirement and two kids and 3 1/2 years away. She does have a wild card in Cincinnati this week and will play Anhelina Kalinina in the first round
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“She, like Stakusic, gets a wild card from the Octagon agency, and will face a qualifier in the first round of Cincinnati).” Both had double negative results – a shame. But thank you for this insight.