More people than ever seem to follow tennis, as data suggest the sport now has a billion fans. And, without argument, 2024 should be as exciting of a year as we have ever seen, packed to the brim with fierce competition. On that note, below, we list five players (male and female) who will likely win super notable tournaments this year. Let’s get to it.
Iga Swiatek – French Open
Swiatek is the current top singles player per the Women’s Tennis Association. The pole has held this spot for over a year and a half, and she won the French Open these past two years and in 2020. The twenty-two-year-old has an all-court playing style with a terrific baseline drop-shot. She was named TIME’s one hundred most influential people in 2023, the same year she was awarded the Polish Sports Personality of the Year title.
Iga is a dominant force on all surfaces, and at her young age, she has done more than most top-rated players will ever do. As a three-time French Open winner, most Internet bookies have her as a 6/5 favorite to lift the Suzanne Lenglen Cup one more time. Pundits believe she will do so many times more before calling it a day, as on red Earth, she is as dangerous as Nadal, earning the nickname – the Queen of Clay. Gauf and Svitolina must display consistent improvements to pose realistic threats to Iga, but few think they will threaten in 2024.
Novak Djokovic – US Open
Novak surprisingly lost the 2024 Australia Open semi-final to Jannik Sinner, who went on to win the tournament. Various reports came out after the Djokovic-Sinner contest concluded, with some journalists speculating that the Serbian struggled with an elbow injury and others said he might have had the flu. Members of his camp came out with a statement that Novak was just fine going into the match, and it was just a case of the better man coming out on top.
Despite the surprisingly poor showing against Sinner, most top-rated online sportsbooks still have Novak as a favorite to go in the US Open, giving him 9/5 outright odds at the time of writing. Djokovic claimed the top prize in the tournament and has now played at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in 2011, 2015, 2018, and 2023. Hence, he is its reigning champion.
Aryna Sabalenka – US Open
Aryna Sabalenka, the Belarus sensation, has won only two major singles titles, the 2024 and 2023 Australian Open tournaments. Sabalenka burst onto the scene in 2017 and drew attention due to her aggressive playing style, which features numerous unforced errors. That is a distinct prop market that some bookmaker sites allow. Yet, many renowned ones do not permit it, as evident in this EveryGame review.
In 2024, Sabalenka had her best run of form at the US Open, beating multiple top contenders en route to the competition semi-final. On her way there, she defeated Clara Burel, Catherine Harrison, and Karolína Plískova, among others. But she faced world No. 1, Iga Swiatek, in the semi-finals and lost again to the Pole. Most experts agree that Belarus is poised for great things in 2024, and she proved that with her second consecutive Australian Open title. Most tipsters think she can go all the way in the Queens-based Grand Slam.
Jannik Sinner – Olympics
In Tokyo 2020, technically 2021, Alexander Zverev claimed a gold medal for Germany in men’s singles tennis. The German pro, born to Russian parents, would again get touted as the player most likely to win the Paris 2024 games in men’s singles if Italian Jannik Sinner did not make his first Olympics appearance at the Paris Games.
Sinner will undoubtedly get the favorite role as Russian Daniil Medvedev will probably choose not to compete in the Olympics, which is very likely as Medvedev was super dissatisfied with the conditions in Tokyo, asking the press who would take responsibility if he died on the court amid a game on account of spiking temperatures and humidity in Tokyo. Sinner will be making his Olympics debut, and expectations are that he will easily find himself on the podium above the number one.
Ons Jabeur – Wimbledon
Tunisia has never been a land famous for producing high-quality tennis professionals. Yet, Africa’s northernmost country now gets associated with this super popular leisure and competitive activity. That is owed to Ons Jabeur, the second-highest-rank women’s player in the world, who is the first female Arab to win titles at the top level of sports. Most credit here goes to raising tennis’s profile in Arifa and breaking stereotypes about competitions from the continent.
Jabeur reached the Wimbledon final twice, in 2022 and 2023, losing in both efforts against Elena Rybakina and Markéta Vondroušová, respectively. However, 2024 seems to be her year, and authority figures agree, despite many odds setters giving Swiatek, Sabalenka, and Rybakina better-winning chances. Jabeur should have gotten enough experience playing at Wimbledon under pressure to beat the odds and get the Venus Rosewater Dish trophy.