Ranking Reaction: Barbora Krejcikova up to No. 5, Iga Swiatek up to No. 6

Though neither of them played any of the WTA events that took place last week in Luxembourg and Portoroz, the last two Roland Garros women’s champions—Barbora Krejcikova and Iga Swiatek—have both struck new career-highs on the WTA rankings this week after a few other big names dropped down the Top 10.

With Sofia Kenin falling from No. 6 to No. 7 and Naomi Osaka from No. 5 to No. 8, that made room for Krejcikova to rise from No. 7 to No. 5 and Swiatek from No. 8 to No. 6.

Krejcikova, who followed up her 2021 Roland Garros title with a fourth-round showing at Wimbledon and the quarterfinals of the US Open, is the 85th woman to reach the Top 5 since WTA rankings began in 1975, and the eighth Czech woman to do it.

CZECH WOMEN TO REACH TOP 5 OF WTA RANKINGS
~ Martina Navratilova (career-high No. 1)
~ Karolina Pliskova (career-high No. 1)
~ Jana Novotna (career-high No. 2)
~ Petra Kvitova (career-high No. 2)
~ Hana Mandlikova (career-high No. 3)
~ Helena Sukova (career-high No. 4)
~ Lucie Safarova (career-high No. 5)
~ Barbora Krejcikova (career-high No. 5)

Swiatek, the 2020 Roland Garros champion, was actually the only woman to make the second week of all four Grand Slams in 2021—she reached the quarterfinals at Roland Garros and the fourth round at the Australian Open, Wimbledon and the US Open.

The 20-year-old is the second-highest-ranked Polish player in ATP or WTA rankings history, after Agnieszka Radwanska, who went as high as No. 2. Only one other Polish player has reached the Top 10: Wojtek Fibak, who got to No. 10 on the ATP rankings.

There were new career-highs for three players in the No. 11-20 range, too, most notably Maria Sakkari, who last week became the highest-ranked Greek woman in WTA rankings history when she rose from No. 18 to No. 13, surpassing Eleni Daniilidou’s record of No. 14. This week, Sakkari does herself one better by inching up to No. 12. Elena Rybakina and Ons Jabeur also set new personal bests, rising to No. 16 and No. 17.

Also, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova moves up from No. 14 to No. 13, returning to her career-high for the first time in more than a decade. She first got to No. 13 in July 2011 and spent five weeks there throughout that summer, and now—just a few months after reaching her first Grand Slam final at Roland Garros—she’s finally back there.

US Open champion Emma Raducanu also moves up to a new career-high of No. 22, with American Jessica Pegula right behind at her own new personal best of No. 23. And the two champions from last week’s WTA events also shot up to new highs, with Luxembourg winner Clara Tauson of Denmark going from No. 70 to No. 52 and Portoroz winner Jasmine Paolini of Italy rising from No. 87 to No. 64.

There were no ATP events last week, but a pair of ATP 250s kick off on Monday in Metz, France and Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan.