1. Jo Konta 60
2. Heather Watson 85
3. Sam Murray Sharan 160
4. Emma Raducanu 190
5. Harriet Dart 195
6. Fran Jones 200
7. Jodie Burrage 280
8. Katy Dunne 480
9. Matilda Mutavdzic 590
10.Emilie Lindh 650

Res: Katie Boulter 240

-- Edited by telstar on Wednesday 23rd of December 2020 06:48:54 PM

-- Edited by telstar on Thursday 24th of December 2020 03:44:22 PM

-- Edited by telstar on Saturday 26th of December 2020 08:24:17 PM

25 years ago, this was the picture

Chris Goldsmith
@TheTennisTalker
·
2h
1985 British year end WTA tennis rankings

24
Annabel_Croft
26 Jodurie

40 Hobbs
77 Gomer
89 Wade
110 Brown
154 Reeves

the addict wrote:

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This is what the WTA currently have on their website

"Under the revised system, a players ranking will be comprised of her best 16 results in singles and best 11 results in doubles based on the points earned between March 2019 through December 2020. A players ranking breakdown will include the "Better of 2019 and 2020" points earned at Tour-level and Grand Slam events. Further, a player may not count the same WTA Tour or Grand Slam level result twice in her ranking breakdown. Tour-level points added in 2020 will drop after the event is scheduled to be played again in 2021 or after 52 weeks, whichever is earlier."

If you want to see what points are dropping when, some of the rankings websites give breakdowns for individual players, with drop dates. Not sure how reliable they are at the moment though, as some of them are slow to update and have occasional errors.

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Thank you TA, but this still leaves me with as many questions as answers.  Open Era Rankings shows the ATP players retaining points from 2020 events in Jan and Feb until 2022, but the WTA points for the same period dropping in 2021.  I'm not sure if this is right or if the web sites just aren't up to date and I can't find anything which actually explains what the rules are.  I'm not expecting anyone here to come up with the answers, just expressing my frustration at the lack of clarity.  Folks may think I'm making a fuss about nothing but I think it's relevant.  Heather and Harriet both have significant points to defend from last year, and if they don't match them in January their rankings will drop with a consequent effect on the entries they can get etc etc.  Maybe I should just resort to sticking a pin into a list 

My team , not very optimistic , hope somebody proves me wrong. I've only selected 10 players  and have not picked a reserve.

 

1. J. Konta 50

2. H. Watson 95

3. E.Raducanu 190

4. H. Dart 200

5. J.Burrage 205

6. F. Jones 210

7. N. Bains 220

8. K. Boulter 230

9. K. Swan 250

10. M.Mutavdzic 300

 

 

 

 

 

Plenty of thinking time still, I'm not even looking at people's entries until I've made my own choice some time next week. Good to see the response so far though

Although our rankings are nowhere near as good as they were in the 1985 era or the late 70's when Virginia Wade and Sue Barker were at their peak, I think the drop in rankings is mostly due to the increasing professionalism and global raising of standards in tennis, with tennis players now developing in way more countries than they did in that era.

Players outside the top 100 up to the end of the 1970's were often very poor and there were far fewer professionals overall than there are now; tennis was then pretty much confined to just a few elite countries, but now it is a much more global sport, so as it expands, all the countries that previously dominated have declined in the numbers of top players; I am sure for instance that there are less Australians, Spanish and French in the top 150 than in that era.

With the ITF circuit, all the lower ranked players are getting a much better chance to develop and of course many more countries are now producing huge amounts of decent tennis players; think for instance of how many players Slovakia (a tiny country) and Romania have produced in the last few years.

I feel the mushrooming of tournaments being played all across the globe has meant tennis is way more professional and competitive in the lower echelons - I have no stats for how many full time professional tennis players there were in 1985, but I would guess it is way less (a half or a third) of what it is now. Lovely though it is to reminisce, I have a feeling that lots of our young players now would have been close to the standards of Sara Gomer and Annabel Croft in that era, and so many more countries are producing technically good tennis players than they were that long ago.

ROSAMUND wrote:

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Andy Parker wrote:

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Although our rankings are nowhere near as good as they were in the 1985 era or the late 70's when Virginia Wade and Sue Barker were at their peak, I think the drop in rankings is mostly due to the increasing professionalism and global raising of standards in tennis, with tennis players now developing in way more countries than they did in that era.

Players outside the top 100 up to the end of the 1970's were often very poor and there were far fewer professionals overall than there are now; tennis was then pretty much confined to just a few elite countries, but now it is a much more global sport, so as it expands, all the countries that previously dominated have declined in the numbers of top players; I am sure for instance that there are less Australians, Spanish and French in the top 150 than in that era.

With the ITF circuit, all the lower ranked players are getting a much better chance to develop and of course many more countries are now producing huge amounts of decent tennis players; think for instance of how many players Slovakia (a tiny country) and Romania have produced in the last few years.

I feel the mushrooming of tournaments being played all across the globe has meant tennis is way more professional and competitive in the lower echelons - I have no stats for how many full time professional tennis players there were in 1985, but I would guess it is way less (a half or a third) of what it is now. Lovely though it is to reminisce, I have a feeling that lots of our young players now would have been close to the standards of Sara Gomer and Annabel Croft in that era, and so many more countries are producing technically good tennis players than they were that long ago.

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Mentioning the likes of Sara Gomer and Annabel Croft, I'm sure they would not have ranked so highly if they had played today. In Sara Gomer's case she played  singles in 31 Grand Slam tournaments between 1983 and 1992 and only reached the 3rd round on one occasion. That was in the 1991 US Open when she lost in the 3rd round to the eventual winner Monica Seles. It was a good tournament for GB because Jo Durie reached the 4th round losing to semi finalist Jennifer Capriati. That 4th round by Jo was a high water mark for British  womens' tennis for a long time  because Sam Smith  made the 4th round of Wimbledon in 1998 and then we had to wait another 14 years until 2012 when Laura Robson reached the 4th round of the US Open. Johanna Konta has ensured things have improved since then with 8 appearances  in the 4th round or better of Grand Slam singles and Laura reached the 4th round  of 2013 Wimbledon singles. 

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 The other thing is that our players of the 80s era had so many different styles; serve and volley, all court games, strong forehand and single-handed backhand; nowadays most have the same style; hard hitting from the back and double-handed backhands.