What is tennis qualification criteria for Olympic Games? Battle for minimal spots likely with big names currently not eligible

With the Olympic Games on the horizon in, it holds an interesting set of qualification criteria and for a lot of players, they have been battling to find a spot in the team for Paris. Scheduled to run between 27 July - 4 August, 2024, there will already be a new gold medalist in the WTA with Belinda Bencic pregnant and unable to take part. Alexander Zverev is the current men's gold medalist.

But there are a lot of returning stars who currently won't qualify due to the rules on offer and will claw for final spots which are very few and far between. Bianca Andreescu was the latest to throw her hat in the ring with the Canadian never having played at the Olympic Games and currently out of action likely until Roland Garros. She could use a protected ranking to get in due to her being injured as opposed to out of the sport. Or she could use the special exemption albeit there is more of a battle for that.

The main qualifying criteria will be the players' positions on the ATP and WTA rankings as of 10 June, 2024. The players entering are submitted to the ITF. This will be determined off the last 52 weeks of the qualifying window. They must also satisfy the key criteria of playing in two Billie Jean King Cup or Davis Cup in the period.

This in turn has seen a lot of players claw to help their eligibility. Emma Raducanu is one. She has played twice in the past cycle in 2022 and 2024, but is not currently ranked high enough. As per the ITF, there are two spots available into each of the men's and singles draws for Grand Slam champions currently ranked outside the top 100 with Angelique Kerber, Naomi Osaka, Simona Halep, Emma Raducanu and Bianca Andreescu all likely vying for that spot. As three-time Grand Slam champions, Kerber and Osaka currently head up that list by that route for qualification.

Simona Halep has also gone the pen and paper route and decided to submit her cause to the ITF after being banned for the predominate period as she aims to play one final Olympic Games. But most of it is very much a minefield and one that will see multiple names miss out. In the Men's it is a tiny bit more clean cut with Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz likely to be the two. Both have not played for Spain so don't qualify despite the latter being high up in the ranking. But Nadal in particular will be the poster child for Spain's cause so barring a huge snub, he will likely take his spot. For many though throwing their hat in the ring, their surge has come too late.