Madison Keys joked she was "jealous" of Elena Rybakina's massive WTA Finals payday while discussing the Kazakh's outstanding week in Riyadh with fellow players Jessica Pegula and Jennifer Brady.
At the start of October, Rybakina seemed like a long shot to make the WTA Finals. But then, the Kazakh won the WTA 500 tournament in Ningbo and also reached the Tokyo semifinal - all while Mirra Andreeva stunningly picked up three consecutive losses. As a result, the 2022 Wimbledon champion narrowly beat out Andreeva for the last spot in Riyadh.
Rybakina's strong form continued in Riyadh, where she impressively went 3-0 in the group before also beating Pegula in the semifinal and Aryna Sabalenka in the final, respectively. As a reward for going a perfect 5-0 at this year's WTA Finals edition, the 26-year-old collected a $5.2 million prize money.
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"She won Ningbo, she semied Tokyo, and then just won the year-end," Keys said on The Player's Box.
Pegula added: "And then she went undefeated. She won undefeated and she wins $5.2 million."
Keys: We are jealous...
After the Kazakh's massive Riyadh money was brought up, the reigning Australian Open champion funnily said: "We're jealous."
Meanwhile, Brady chimmed in by funnily wondering whether the reigning WTA Finals would pick the Maldives as her off-season vacation spot.
"I wonder where she's vacationing. I wonder if she's going to the Maldives with the rest of the Tour," Brady said.
Meanwhile, when addressing her WTA Finals prize money, Rybakina acknowledged it was a pretty nice sum but humbly insisted that she didn't think about it too much and that she was only focused on playing her best tennis.
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"Well, it's definitely a huge amount... Honestly, I didn't think about any of that so much, but, of course, it's great, and we definitely need to celebrate really well with the team, family and everyone," Rybakina said.
