When tennis players are close to making the cut, and every match counts, it is easy to feel the heat.Italy’s Lorenzo Musetti was one of the final players trying to qualify for the ATP Finals.

The country was once a force, with Bjorn Borg and Mats Wilander leading the way. Now, none of its players are highly ranked.“What happened in the ’80s was the perfect storm where everything came together,” Stefan Edberg, the former tennis star, center, said of Sweden’s long-ago domination of the sport. “It’s not going to happen again for the next 100 years.” On the far left is f...

Gaby Dabrowski and Erin Routliffe have been playing together since 2023 and won the Finals last year and the U.S. Open twice.Dabrowski, left, and Routliffe are the reigning U.S. Open women’s doubles champions, and, as the third seeds, they are making their third consecutive appearance at the WTA Finals.

In a push for prize money equal to the men, the tour for 15 years made its format more taxing. ‘We wanted the world to know that we weren’t wilting flowers,’ Martina Navratilova said.

After he was suspended in 1973, 81 players boycotted the tournament in solidarity, highlighting a power struggle for control of the sport.Nikola Pilic in 2004. He led a successful career as a coach, with Novak Djokovic often referring to him as “my tennis father.”