Australian Open 2025: Aryna Sabalenka, Iga Swiatek and Coco Gauff lead the women's field

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Here are some of the top women at the Australian Open, which starts at Melbourne Park on Sunday local time (Saturday night EST), with money-line odds via BetMGM Sportsbook:

Seeding: 1

Career-Best Ranking: 1

Country: Belarus

Age: 26

2024 Record: 56-14

2024 Titles: 4

Career Titles: 18

Grand Slam Titles: 3 — Australian Open (2: 2023, 2024), U.S. Open (1: 2024)

Last 5 Australian Opens: 2024-Won Championship, 2023-W, 2022-Lost in 4th Rd, 2021-4th, 2020-1st

Aces: Went 18-1 in Grand Slam play last season, the best showing by a woman since Serena Williams was 26-1 in 2015. ... Won the past two Australian Open titles and is listed as the money-line favorite this time in Melbourne Park. ... Won 27 of her past 28 matches in Australia, including a title last week in Brisbane. ... Took over as No. 1 from Iga Swiatek late last season. ... Recently joined Evolve, the agency founded by Naomi Osaka and her representative.

She Said It: “You always have to look for something to improve. I think I will never stop working on my serve.”

Read All About It: Sabalenka is as good as it gets on hard courts

Odds Are: +240

Seeding: 2

Career-Best Ranking: 1

Country: Poland

Age: 23

2024 Record: 61-9

2024 Titles: 5

Career Titles: 22

Grand Slam Titles: 5 — French Open (4: 2020, 2022, 2023, 2024), U.S. Open (1: 2022)

Last 5 Australian Opens: 2024-3rd, 2023-4th, 2022-SF, 2021-4th, 2020-4th

Aces: Accepted a one-month suspension in November after testing positive for a banned substance she said came from a contaminated supplement. ... Was ranked No. 1 for most of 2022, 2023 and 2024, before ceding the stop spot while she was sidelined by her doping case — although no one knew at the time she was barred from competing. ... Is 5-0 in Grand Slam finals. ... Paired with veteran coach Wim Fissette late last year.

She Said It: “For sure, I’m not a complete player. I think tactically there are many ways I could go and have more variety on court. Wim has some nice ideas.”

Read All About It: An explanation of Swiatek's doping case

Odds Are: +400

Seeding: 3

Career-Best Ranking: 2

Country: United States

Age: 20

2024 Record: 54-17

2024 Titles: 3

Career Titles: 9

Grand Slam Titles: 1 — U.S. Open (2023)

Last 5 Australian Opens: 2024-SF, 2023-4th, 2022-1st, 2021-2nd, 2020-4th

Aces: Beat Iga Swiatek while helping the U.S. win the United Cup last week. ... Gauff's total earnings — prize money plus endorsement deals — of $30.4 million in 2024 put her at No. 1 among all female athletes, according to Sportico. ... Split from coach Brad Gilbert and hired Matt Daly to work alongside Jean-Christophe “JC” Faurel after the U.S. Open. Daly seems to have helped Gauff alter her grips for her forehand and serve. ... Closed 2024 by winning the WTA Finals for the first time, her biggest title since the 2023 U.S. Open. ... Has won one Grand Slam title in singles and one in doubles.

She Said It: “The key is, when you reach a low, the only way you can go is up. So ... I just said, ‘Well, I have to get better at some things, and just try to do that.’"

Read All About It: Gauff ends her 2024 season with a WTA Finals title and a big turnaround

Odds Are: +400

Seeding: 4

Career-Best Ranking: 4

Country: Italy

Age: 29

2024 Record: 41-20

2024 Titles: 1

Career Titles: 2

Grand Slam Titles: None — Best: Runner-Up, French Open (2024), Wimbledon (2024)

Last 5 Australian Opens: 2024-4th, 2023-1st, 2022-1st, 2021-1st, 2020-1st

Aces: Was 0-4 at the Australian Open for her career until last year's breakthrough run to the fourth round, which helped catapult her to a terrific season. ... Each of her initial 16 Grand Slam appearances resulted in losses in the first or second round, a rut that ended at Melbourne in 2024. ... Teamed with Sara Errani to win a gold medal for Italy in women’s doubles at the Paris Olympics and helped the country win the Billie Jean King Cup.

She Said It: “If somebody told me at the beginning of the year, ‘You’re going to play WTA Finals, singles and doubles,’ that would be crazy.”

Read All About It: Paolini wins Wimbledon’s longest semifinal to reach a 2nd Slam final

Odds Are: +3300

Seeding: 5

Career-Best Ranking: 5

Country: China

Age: 22

2024 Record: 50-18

2024 Titles: 3

Career Titles: 5

Grand Slam Titles: None — Best: Runner-Up, Australian Open (2024)

Last 5 Australian Opens: 2024-RU, 2023-2nd, 2022-2nd, 2021-Did Not Play, 2020-DNP

Aces: A rising star who made it to her first Grand Slam final at the Australian Open in January 2024, then picked up her most significant title so far at the Paris Olympics in August. ... Working with Dante Bottini — who has coached Kei Nishikori and others — in Australia this year while her principal coach, Pere Riba, is out because of surgery.

She Said It: Winning a gold medal “was the best moment, by far, in my career.”

Read All About It: Zheng Qinwen wins China’s 1st Olympic singles tennis gold

Odds Are: +1400

Seeding: 6

Career-Best Ranking: 3

Country: Kazakhstan

Age: 25

2024 Record: 42-11

2024 Titles: 3

Career Titles: 8

Grand Slam Titles: 1 — Wimbledon (2022)

Last 5 Australian Opens: 2024-2nd, 2023-RU, 2022-2nd, 2021-2nd, 2020-3rd

Aces: Coaching situation is a bit in flux: She split from Stefano Vukov and hired Goran Ivanisevic, then brought back Vukov recently. But the WTA recently said that Vukov “is currently under a provisional suspension pending an independent investigation into a potential breach of the WTA Code of Conduct” and so cannot be credentialed by the tour. ... Her big hitting carried her to the 2023 final in Melbourne.

She Said It: “(Vukov) never mistreated me. ... I'm not really happy with this situation.”

Read All About It: Rybakina's first Grand Slam title came at Wimbledon in 2022

Odds Are: +900

FILE - Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan plays a forehand return to Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic during their semifinal match at the Wimbledon tennis championships in London, Thursday, July 11, 2024. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, File)

FILE - Qinwen Zheng of China returns the ball against Iga Swiatek of Poland during their women's semifinals match at the Roland Garros stadium, at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Paris, France. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez, File)

FILE - Italy's Jasmine Paolini returns the ball to Slovakia's Rebecca Sramkova during the Billie Jean King Cup final at the Martin Carpena Sports Hall in Malaga, southern Spain, on Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez, File)

FILE - Coco Gauff of the U.S. in action during her women's singles semi final match against Belarus' Aryna Sabalenka at King Saud University Indoor Arena, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Friday, Nov. 8, 2024. (AP Photo, File)

FILE - Poland's Iga Swiatek plays a shot against Italy's Jasmine Paolini during the women's final of the French Open tennis tournament at the Roland Garros stadium in Paris, France, Saturday, June 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard, File)

FILE - Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus plays a forehand return to Zheng Qinwen of China during the women's singles final at the Australian Open tennis championships at Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia, Saturday, Jan. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Defending champion Jannik Sinner and 10-time Australian Open winner Novak Djokovic have landed in opposite sides of the draw for the season’s first major, ruling out a replay of last year’s semifinal match.

Sinner upset Djokovic in the semifinals here last year before coming back to beat Daniil Medvedev in the final 3-6, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-3 for his first Grand Slam singles title.

Top-ranked Sinner has a first-round match against Nicolas Jarry and also has Taylor Fritz, Ben Shelton and Medvedev in his quarter of the draw. Fritz will open against fellow American Jenson Brooksby.

Djokovic and No. 3 Carlos Alcaraz could meet in the quarterfinals, with a possible semifinal against No. 2 Alexander Zverev.

At the draw Thursday to set the brackets for the singles fields, defending champions Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka walked into the official ceremony on the steps of Margaret Court Arena holding their trophies.

Sabalenka won her second consecutive title at Melbourne Park in 2024 by defeating Zheng Qinwen 6-3, 6-2. Sabalenka will be attempting to win a third consecutive women’s singles title at Melbourne Park, something last accomplished by Martina Hingis from 1997 to 1999.

Sabalenka drew a tough opening match against 2017 U.S. Open champion Sloane Stephens and has 17-year-old Mirra Andreeva and Zheng in her section.

“I have a lot of great memories and to be back here ... as a two-time Australian Open champion, it’s definitely something special,” Sabalenka, who won the Brisbane International title last week, said at the draw ceremony. “I hope that I can keep doing what I’m doing here in Australia.”

Third-seeded Coco Gauff is a potential semifinal rival for Sabalenka. Gauff has a challenging first-round match against former Australian Open champion Sofia Kenin and is in the same section of the draw as four-time major winner Naomi Osaka and seventh-seeded Jessica Pegula.

No. 2 Iga Swiatek and 2022 Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina are on the other half of the draw.

The Australian Open starts Sunday morning in Melbourne (Saturday night EST in the U.S.) and will run for 15 days.

Doping and the cases involving Sinner — which is still not fully resolved — and Swiatek was a topic that shadowed tennis in 2024 and is still a talking point in Melbourne.

There's plenty else for fans to talk about.

Djokovic will be playing in his first event alongside new coach Andy Murray, his former on-court rival and a three-time major champion. Nobody has won the men's title at Melbourne Park more often than Djokovic, although he said he still feels trauma from the one year he wasn’t allowed to play.

Nick Kyrgios, the 2022 Wimbledon runner-up who withdrew from an exhibition against Djokovic this week because of an abdominal strain, will face Jacob Fearnley in the first round if the mercurial Australian is fit enough to contest his first major since the 2022 U.S. Open. Kyrgios is in the same section as Zverev.

Tournament director Craig Tiley, left, and tournament referee Wayne McKewen conduct the official draw ahead of the Australian Open tennis championship in Melbourne, Australia, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Vincent Thian)

Defending champions Aryna Sabalenka and Jannik Sinner attend the official draw ceremony ahead of the Australian Open tennis championship in Melbourne, Australia, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Vincent Thian)

Belarus' Aryna Sabalenka celebrates winning against Russia's Polina Kudermetova during their final match at the Brisbane International in Brisbane, Australia, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Pat Hoelscher)

Serbia's Novak Djokovic is watches his coach Andy Murray, right, during a practice session ahead of the Australian Open tennis championship in Melbourne, Australia, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Mark Baker)

Defending champions Aryna Sabalenka and Jannik Sinner attend the official draw ceremony ahead of the Australian Open tennis championship in Melbourne, Australia, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Vincent Thian)