In search of a late-season surge: Four players to watch in Beijing and beyond

Two years ago, Coco Gauff burned through the end of the North American hard-court summer, winning titles in Cincinnati and at the US Open.

Last year, at 20, she failed to defend that Grand Slam crown, losing in the fourth round to Emma Navarro and her summer record was a more pedestrian 4-3. Gauff arrived in China with something to prove, perhaps more to herself than anyone else.

She ripped through the field at the China Open in Beijing to take the title and reached the semifinals in Wuhan before losing to eventual champion Aryna Sabalenka in the semifinals. That marked nine wins in 10 matches in the charged atmosphere of back-to-back WTA 1000s.

And then Gauff carried that momentum into the WTA Finals in Riyadh -- beating No. 1 Sabalenka and No. 2 Iga Swiatek -- and emerged the winner.

This year, Gauff and several of her PIF WTA Rankings Top 10 colleagues find themselves looking for a similar spark as they embark on the Asian swing that begins on Wednesday in Beijing.

Gauff, Madison Keys and Mirra Andreeva all scored big-ticket wins earlier this year and, based on their overall 2025 performance, are in solid position to qualify for the WTA Finals in Riyadh.

Still, along with Swiatek, who has already qualified, Gauff, Keys and Andreeva are among the four players looking for a much-needed boost as the Asian swing begins and the season builds toward its climax in Saudi Arabia. A closer look:

Iga Swiatek

Race position: 2 (7,533)

2025 record: 54-13, 2 titles

Signature win: Wimbledon, defeating Amanda Anisimova 6-0, 6-0 in the final.

The four-time Roland Garros champion posted a surprising breakthrough on the grass at the All England Club. In a quarterfinal rematch with Anisimova at the US Open, however, Swiatek was defeated 6-4, 6-3.

She’s a sturdy 13-2 since Wimbledon but eager to prove herself in Asia. Swiatek’s the top seed in the Korea Open Tennis Championships, where she won her first-round match, before her quarterfinal showdown with Barbora Krejcikova on Friday was postposed because of rain.

“I guess in tennis, like, you will get heartbreaking losses, and you don’t have another option,” Swiatek said in New York. “You just have to move on and try to play good next time.”

Coco Gauff

Race position: 3 (5,184)

2025 record: 38-13, 1 title

Signature win: Roland Garros, defeating Sabalenka in the final.

Since collecting the second major singles title of her career in Paris, Gauff has fashioned a record of 8-5. Her issues with double faults have been well documented and she turned to mechanics expert Gavin MacMillan to solve that. But a few days on the job wasn’t enough to prevent a fourth-round loss to Naomi Osaka.

With a proper training under her belt, Gauff is taking the long view.

“Whatever happens for the rest of the year, I just want it to be improvement,” she told reporters at the US Open. “I don’t care results-wise. Yeah, last year if you told me I would go win in Beijing and WTA Finals, I would have been, like, whatever, because I didn’t really care going into it.

“I’m going to probably have that same mindset.”

Madison Keys

Race position: 5 (4,450)

2025 record: 37-13, 2 titles

Signature win: Australian Open, defeating Swiatek and Sabalenka in the semifinals and finals.

On the cusp of her 30th birthday, Keys won 18 of her first 19 matches this year, taking titles in Adelaide and Melbourne. A new attitude -- she stopped feeling bad about not winning a major title -- carried her to soaring heights in Australia and, of course, she left a Grand Slam champion.

There was a quarterfinal berth at Roland Garros, losing to Gauff, but Keys went out in the third round at Wimbledon and, in a stunner, the first round at the US Open to No. 82-ranked Renata Zarazua.

“I feel like today, for the first time in a while, where my nerves really got the better of me, and it kind of became a little bit paralyzing,” Keys said afterward. “But I think big picture, again, if you told me at the beginning of the year what I was signing up for, I would obviously say yes.

“So that’s allegedly the beauty of the sport.”

Mirra Andreeva

Race position: 7 (4,189)

2025 record: 38-13, 2 titles

Signature win: Indian Wells, defeating Swiatek and Sabalenka in the semifinals and finals.

Quick reality check: At 18, Andreeva is the youngest player in the PIF WTA Rankings Top 35.

When she took the title at Indian Wells -- after winning the WTA 1000 in Dubai -- still 17, Andreeva became the youngest champion there since Serena Williams more than a quarter century ago. That lifted her 2025 record to 19-3, at the time, the most wins on the Hologic WTA Tour.

For any player, sustainability would be difficult. But as a teenager, Andreeva still has so much room to improve. She’s been remarkably consistent in the majors, winning 13 of 17 matches. Andreeva has played only five matches since Wimbledon and suffered an ankle injury in Montreal before falling to Taylor Townsend in the third round of the US Open.

“I am sad that I lost, but I just felt like she was playing good today,” Andreeva said. “Today is the hard day, but I can take a lot of positives from these two weeks, for sure. We’re going to move on and improve.”

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