As we reach the final week of the WTA regular season the singles field for the TEP BNP Paribas WTA Championships is already set, but the final doubles spot is still up for grabs. Two spots in the field for the
Qatar Airways Tournament Of Champions Sofia will also be decided.
With their title in Osaka, the team of Raquel Kops-Jones and Abigail Spears trail the team of Nadia Petrova and Maria Kirilenko by just 32 points for fourth place in the Race to Istanbul. Both teams are in the bottom half of the draw in Moscow. The American needs to advance further than the Russian team, and it could be decided in the semifinals if both teams win their first two matches.
Sofia is a lot more complicated. The top six players who have won an International Series tournament will join two wild cards (Kirlenko, Tsvetana Pironkova) in the draw. So as we enter the final week, the current top six are Caroline Wozniacki, Nadia Petrova, Roberta Vinci, Kaia Kanepi, Zheng Jie, and Hsieh Su-Wei. The top four are secure although Kanepi withdrew from Beijing with a heel injury. Hsieh is ranked 31st and Zheng will drop into the high 20 and neither is playing this week.. There are two ways to knock them out of the field: a player who has already won an International Series event would have to pass Hsieh in the rankings or a player already ranked ahead of them could win Luxembourg.
The top players who have already won an International Series title are Francesca Schiavone, Mona Barthel, and Daniela Hantuchova. Schivone is playing Moscow this week and has drawn Urszula Radwanska in the first round. She'd need to win that and her next match. Barthel and Hantuchova are playing Luxembourg. Either of them would need to reach the semifinals to pass Hsieh in the rankings.
Of course, the only seed in the original draw for Luxembourg to have won an International Series title is top seed Roberta Vinci . The other seven seeds would become eligible for Sofia by winning the title. (Barthel has since replaced Yanina Wickmayer.) The 2nd through 7th seeds are already ranked ahead of Hsieh. Carla Suarez Navarro, the eight seed, is one of several players who could pass Hsieh by winning the title. That list includes Peng Shuai, Venus Williams, and Lucie Hradecka.
So the top 4 are pretty secure, while the last two sports are up for grabs. It possible that both the Luxembourg champion and another player could both qualify for Sofia.