Women's Tennis Finals to Start in Riyadh on Saturday, First Time in Saudi Arabia

The highly anticipated Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) Finals Championship will begin on Saturday. The tournament will be hosted for the first time in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia at the King Saud University Indoor Arena in Riyadh. The championship runs until November 9 and is organized by the Saudi Tennis Federation under the supervision of the Ministry of Sport, with sponsorship from the Public Investment Fund (PIF).

 The event marks the season-ending finals of the WTA Tour for 2024 and will feature the world's top players competing in a round-robin format in both singles and doubles. With prize money exceeding $15 million, the singles champion will receive the Billie Jean King Trophy, while the doubles champions will be awarded the Martina Navratilova Trophy.

 Some of the world's top-ranked players will participate, including Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka (world No. 1), Pole Iga Swiatek (world No. 2), and the 2023 champions, Americans Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula.

 Other competitors include Italian Jasmine Paolini, Kazakh Elena Rybakina, Chinese Qinwen Zheng, and Czech Barbora Krejcikova.

 In addition, the top eight doubles teams will compete, consisting of the following pairings: Latvian Jelena Ostapenko and Ukrainian Lyudmyla Kichenok, Canadian Gabriela Dabrowski and New Zealander Erin Routliffe, Chinese Shuai Zhang and Belgian Elise Mertens, Italians Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini, Americans Desirae Krawczyk and Caroline Dolehide, American Nicole Melichar-Martinez and Australian Ellen Perez, Chinese Hao-Ching Chan and Russian Veronika Kudermetova, and American Taylor Townsend and Czech Katerina Siniakova.

 The WTA Finals will be hosted in the Kingdom for three consecutive years, starting in 2024. The event is part of the Kingdom's initiative to promote women's tennis and represents a significant milestone in its history of hosting major international events and activities.