In this first-ever episode of the On The Line podcast, Oliver Dickson Jefford and I tackle Caroline Garcia's push to Singapore, new world number one Simona Halep, and the titles of Rafael Nadal and David Goffin in Beijing and Tokyo respectively.

We also discuss the current WTA Finals field which has the likes of Garbiñe Muguruza, Karolina Pliskova, and Jelena Ostapenko in the field. The last hot topic for this episode was our take on the changes that the ATP NextGen Finals will have, and its current field. Neither of us believe Alexander Zverev will be headed to Milan due to how close the timing is to the ATP World Tour Finals, but we do think the likes of Francis Tiafoe will benefit from Zverev not going.

Neither of us were fans of the all HawkEye line calls nor the scoring system, but we do believe that the limit on medical timeouts and serving time is fine, albeit there are some grey areas for the serving clock.

Picks For The Week

Shanghai

Noel

  1. Semifinalists: Nadal, Kyrgios*, A. Zverev, Federer
  2. Finalists/Winner: Kyrgios, Federer/Federer
  3. Sleeper Pick: Kyrgios
  4. Early Exit: K. Anderson**

Oliver

  1. Semifinalists: Nadal, Carreño Busta***, A. Zverev, Federer
  2. Finalists/Winner: Nadal, Federer/Nadal
  3. Sleeper Pick: Kyrgios*
  4. Early Exit: Thiem

*Kyrgios retired vs Steve Johnson

**Anderson defeated Mannarino in straights

***Carreño Busta eliminated by Ramos-Viñolas

Hong Kong

Noel

  1. Semifinalists: Svitolina, Wozniacki, Pavlyuchenkova, Vesnina*
  2. Finalists/Winner: Svitolina, Pavlyuchenkova/Svitolina
  3. Sleeper Pick: Gavrilova
  4. Early Exit: Radwanska

Oliver

  1. Semifinalists: Svitolina, Wozniacki, Venus, Vesnina*
  2. Finalists/Winner: Svitolina, Vesnina*/Svitolina
  3. Sleeper Pick: Osaka
  4. Early Exit: Radwanska

*Vesnina eliminated to Luksika Kumkhum

Tianjin

Noel

  1. Semifinalists: Peng, Sharapova, Vekic, Tsurenko
  2. Finalists/Winner: Sharapova, Tsurenko/Sharapova
  3. Sleeper Pick: Haddad Maia
  4. Early Exit: Kvitova

Oliver

  1. Semifinalists: Peng, Sharapova, Vekic, Tsurenko
  2. Finalists/Winner: Peng, Tsurenko/Peng
  3. Sleeper Pick: Sakkari
  4. Early Exit: Kvitova

Linz

Noel

  1. Semifinalists: Siniakova, Cirstea, Strycova, Kontaveit*
  2. Finalists/Winner: Cirstea, Strycova/Strycova
  3. Sleeper Pick: Bencic
  4. Early Exit: Bertens

Oliver

  1. Semifinalists: Cirstea, Bertens, Strycova, Kontaveit*
  2. Finalists/Winner: Cirstea, Strycova/Cirstea
  3. Sleeper Pick: Bencic
  4. Early Exit: Niculescu**

*Kontaveit eliminated by Buzarnescu

**Niculescu out to Arruabarrena