The battle to finish the WTA Tour year as world No 1 was comprehensively won by Aryna Sabalenka, but the alternative tennis rankings suggest the US Open champion has a big challenger for the top spot heading into 2025.

Sabalenka’s wins at the Australian Open and US Open were backed up by dominant performances across the WTA Tour season, with her No 1 year-end ranking confirmed before she finished playing her final match at the WTA Finals.

Yet the Belarusian star could not add the lucrative end-of-season tournament in Saudi Arabia to her list of big wins in 2024, as she was beaten by Coco Gauff in a compelling semi-final in Riyadh.

Gauff’s opponent in that final was the hugely impressive Chinese star Zheng Qinwen, who was a stand-out performer in the women’s game in 2024, winning an Olympic gold medal in Paris and confirming that she is a consistent performer who can challenge the best players in the tennis.

Zheng reached the final of the Australian Open in January and the quarter-finals at the US Open, while also backing up her WTA points total by reaching the semi-finals of the China Open and the final of the Wuhan Open.

She claimed $5,559,555 in prize money in 2024 and finished the year as world No 5, but she has lept to the top of the women’s rankings in the alternative UTR Rating.

This rating is endorsed by 24-time Grand Slam champion Novak Djokovic and uses an algorithm that calculates the rankings based on recent form rather than the year-round calculation of the ATP Ranking.

Victories against higher-ranked played are worth more in the UTR list than the official ATP or WTA Ranking, meaning they offer up a more accurate reflection of the current form at the top of the game.

The UTR Rankings are based on the current form from the last few weeks and months rather than reflecting results that occurred up to a year ago, with the system created to promote fair and competitive play across the tennis world.

All players, regardless of age, gender, geography, or skill level, are rated on the same scale between 1.00 and 16.50 based on actual match results.

The UTR Ranking is open to players of all levels of the game and the algorithm used provides an intriguing insight at the top of the game.

The method used to calculate the UTR rating explains why Zheng is rating so highly on the latest UTR list, with Coco Gauff’s win against Sabalenka and Zheng as she lifted the WTA Finals title seeing the American leap up to No 2 on the list.

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Iga Swiatek is at No 3 in the UTR ranking and Sabalenka comes in at No 4, just ahead of Elena Rybakina.

A resurgent Paula Badosa is at No 6, with Karolina Muchova at No 7, Emma Navarro at No 8, Jessica Pegula in ninth place and Mirra Andreeva in 10th.

This list also suggests Britain’s Emma Raducanu deserves to be ranked higher than the 58th place she has moved up to in the WTA Rankings after a solid comeback year.

Raducanu showed good form for Britain in the Billie Jean King Cup as she won all three of her singles matches in the finals in Malaga and she is positioned at No 25 in the UTR Ratings, one place behind her fellow Brit Katie Boulter.

The UTR ratings always stir up plenty of debate when they are updated and Sabalenka’s lowly position in the current list is just as big a talking point as Zheng’s rise to No 1.

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