Aryna Sabalenka's return to the world No. 1 spot this Monday left some surprised but there was a reason why the change at the top happened although neither the Belarusian nor Iga Swiatek played this past week.
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After the 26-year-old made the Beijing quarterfinal and won Wuhan - the WTA 1000 tournaments that the Pole missed - the lead at the Belarusian tennis star reduced the lead at the top to just 69 points.
Since the WTA Finals was supposed to be the next tournament for both stars, the belief was that Sabalenka's next chance at overtaking Swiatek would come in Riyadh.
But starting this week, the WTA started applying zero-pointers for each WTA 500 tournament missed. As per new rules, players are required to play at least six tournaments from that category.
How many ranking points Sabalenka and Swiatek lost?
With this week's WTA 500 tournament in Tokyo being the lone tournament left from that category, the WTA started giving zero-pointers to those who won't fulfill the mandating rule.
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Since Sabalenka appeared in four WTA 500 tournaments while Swiatek did in two, both faced penalties. However, the Belarusian lost a total of nine ranking points and now sits at 9,706. On the other side, the Pole dropped 120 points and now has 9665.
After this week's Tokyo tournament, their ranking points will be further deducted but there won't be any changes at the world No. 1 spot.
For the 26-year-old, this is her ninth week at the top spot and the first one since 2023 September.
"Yeah, that's really tight ranking right now. Really nice to see. I always say of course it's one of the goals, but I prefer to focus on myself and just keep working hard. We'll see after the Finals if I was good enough this season to become world No. 1," Sabalenka said after winning Wuhan when addressing the prospect of replacing Swiatek at the top.
