WTA Finals Preview: Iga Swiatek and Coco Gauff are finishing up-and-down seasons with new coaches

The most important takeaway from the WTA’s 2024 campaign may be an exceedingly simple one:

It’s a long season.

So long that that even the tour’s best players and most committed competitors will cycle through multiple peaks and valleys before it’s over. The schedule lasts for more than 10 months, but it’s tough for anyone to play their best on a daily basis for more than a couple of those months at a time.

Iga Swiatek and Coco Gauff, who will face off in the tour’s year-end championships in Riyadh on Tuesday, can both attest to that as they bring their sometimes-superb, sometimes-shaky seasons to a close

WATCH: Swiatek vs. Gauff not before 7 a.m. PT Tuesday on Tennis Channel or stream on our app

Swiatek was the clear No. 1 through June, winning titles in Doha, Indian Wells, Madrid, Rome and Paris. Since then, she’s played just four events and hasn’t reached the final of any. In the fall, she split with her long-time coach, Tomasz Wiktorowski, skipped two mandatory tournaments in China, and ceded her No. 1 ranking.

Gauff had a respectable start to the year, making the semifinals at the Australian Open, Indian Wells, Rome and Roland Garros. Then, during the summer swing, the bottom dropped out. She lost to players well below her in the rankings, and split with her coach, Brad Gilbert. Yet just when all looked lost for 2024, Gauff righted the ship to win a 1000-level title in Beijing and make the semis of another in Wuhan. She’ll come into her match with Swiatek having won 11 of her last 12.

Both women arrived in Riyadh with a recent coaching hire in tow. Gauff, after her spell with the high-profile Gilbert, has gone the under-the-radar route this time, adding former college player Matt Daly to her team. As for Swiatek, she has traded Wiktorowski for a well-known quantity in Wim Fissette, a 44-year-old Belgian who has coached Kim Clijsters, Simona Halep, Angelique Kerber, Naomi Osaka, Victoria Azarenka, Petra Kvitova and Zheng Qinwen, among others. It was probably only a matter of time before he got around to working with Iga.

While they went in different directions with their choice of mentors, Swiatek and Gauff sound like they’re looking for something similar from them. No. 1 on their lists is help with the serve. Two of their major rivals, Aryna Sabalenka and Elena Rybakina, win many more free points with their deliveries, while Gauff in particular gives away a lot of free points with double faults.

“I think it’s kind of obvious, I for sure want to improve my serve, as I’ve been doing for past years,” says Swiatek, who has abbreviated her motion and made her second serve less vulnerable. “I feel like I still need to continue that. For sure I’m not a complete player.”

While they went in different directions with their choice of mentors, Swiatek and Gauff sound like they’re looking for something similar from them. No. 1 on their lists is help with the serve.

As for Gauff, she says she has spent the last two weeks making a grip adjustment to that shot.

“I’ve always had a decent serve, pretty good serve,” Gauff says. “I think just to make it more consistent is something that was necessary.”

“It’s difficult,” she says of making a change while her season is still in progress, “but you got to think of the long-term and the long run. I feel like this is the right decision… I think I just need more time with it.”

Beyond their serves, Swiatek and Gauff both sound like they want someone who would have the long haul of their careers in mind. The Pole and the American, despite being stars for half a decade now, are still just 23 and 20, respectively.

“I was looking for someone that was going to help me improve for the long-term and be committed to that,” Gauff says. “I might have had to accept some losses because I am working on things, but just be committed to the process. That’s what I was looking for.”

For Gauff, that will mean improving her forehand along with her serve. In her first match in Riyadh, a straight-set win over Jessica Pegula, she was trying to use more topspin from that side, flicking up on the ball more quickly and severely. The combination of high-bouncing topspin forehands and flat backhand drives has worked well for her in the past.

More than anything, it seems that Gauff wanted someone patient and positive. Judging by his reassuring reactions and and upbeat advice during her matches, Daly is both of those things.

By reputation, Fissette is also both of those things. While he has ridden the coaching carousel from one player to the next for the past 15 years, he has always given off an even-keel vibe. He’s known to be methodical and rely on data, to help with technique, to urge his players to be aggressive, and to adjust his approach to their personalities and needs. He’s also known for immediate results. Clijsters won the 2009 US Open with him in her third tournament back after giving birth.

And, as Charlie Eccleshare points out in an article on Fissette this week in The Athletic, he’ll know several of Swiatek’s opponents from working with them, including Zheng, Osaka and Azarenka.

“I think tactically there are many ways I could go and have more variety on court,” Swiatek says of what she’s looking for with Fissette. “Wim has some nice ideas.”

With Wiktorowksi, Swiatek’s main idea was to maximize her ground-stroke power. But what happens when she can’t hit through someone, or an opponent rushes her on her forehand, a shot that takes time for her to unfurl? That’s where Fissette’s “nice ideas” may come in handy. I also think Swiatek has a tendency to overthink her strokes and her technique, especially with her forehand, and this became more pronounced the longer she worked with Wiktorowski. Maybe Fissette can get her to swing a little more freely and easily.

Neither Gauff nor Swiatek is expecting to have every problem solved in Riyadh. Gauff will be trying out her new service swing, while Swiatek says the real work with Fissette will start once this tournament is over.

The question for them on Tuesday will be whether there is any immediate change in the dynamic of their rivalry. Swiatek, as we know, has dominated it. She’s 11-1 against Gauff, and all 11 of those wins have been in straight sets.

But this is as good a time as any for Gauff to get that second victory. The match will be played on a hard court, which favors the American, and it will come at a moment when Gauff is in good form, and Swiatek is still finding hers after nearly two months away.

Whoever wins will move closer to the semifinals in Riyadh, and likely feel a little better about what’s to come next year.