The year-end championships invites the top 8 players to a round-robin tournament.  Points-wise, it can be worth more than a Masters 1000 event to the winner.  The top 4 have been known for weeks.  Not surprisingly, it’s Djokovic, Nadal, Federer, and Murray.  The next four are Ferrer, Fish, Tsonga, and Berdych.  They have yet to clinch, but despite two Masters 1000 events coming up, there’s no reason to expect these won’t be the four left standing when all is said and done.

It’s not that the gap between Berdych (currently 8th) and Almagro is that far right now, but that these four have stepped up their games this week.  All four (Ferrer, Fish, Tsonga, and Berdych) reached at least the semifinals of the ATP 500 event they are in.  Berdych stands to do better because he’s already reached the finals of Beijing, and with his form, he might win it, thus cementing a decent standing.

Let’s start with each player.

David Ferrer

Ferrer has quietly moved up to 5 in the world with great performances in 2010 and 2011.  He also benefits from Soderling being out with mono since he won Bastad shortly after Wimbledon (Ferrer was the losing finalist to Soderling).  Although Ferrer reached the semis of Tokyo, normally a laudable accomplishment, he actually reached the finals of Beijing last year.  Technically, his points would actually decrease.  Fortunately, due to a best of 18 rule, that Beijing finals points doesn’t have to be counted (he has 3 other comparable ATP 500 results that are worth at least as much).  Where Ferrer has to watch out is Valencia.

Ferrer is the defending champ at Valencia and he picked 500 points from that win.  He may lose ground at that tournament.  The one plus is that he’ll be the top seed (provided no one like Djokovic asks for a wildcard), and he has as decent a shot as anyone to win his hometown tournament.

Ferrer has a 1000 point lead over the next person, so he can afford to lose some points and still do fine.  He should be a shoo-in.  He has round of 16 results in Shanghai and Paris which means he could gain points in either one and move up.

Mardy Fish

Fish is also in pretty good shape.  The main reason is that he was injured throughout this period of time last year.  He made it to the round of 16 in Beijing and pretty much didn’t play the rest of the year.  He’ll pick up 135 points for reaching the semis of Tokyo (over last year’s Beijing result).  He has no points at either Shanghai or Paris, so he can pick up points just by playing.

For Fish, it’s a matter of staying healthy, and he should be in the ATP World Tour Finals.

Jo-Wilfried Tsonga

Tsonga lost early in Tokyo last year and received 0 points.  However, by reaching the semis of Beijing this year, he’ll pick up the full 180 points, so he’ll be in solid shape to play in London.

He reached the quarters of Shanghai last year, but didn’t play Paris.  A quarterfinal result for Tsonga seems reasonable in either tournament, so he should be able to defend points through one or both of these Masters 1000 events.

Tomas Berdych

Berdych is playing some good tennis now.  He’ll pick up anywhere from 120 to 320 points in Beijing depending on whether he wins or not.  If he plays hot in Shanghai, he stands to do better than his Round of 16 result there and in Paris.  Again, he has a solid shot.

The Others

The five players immediately following need about 300 points to catch up to Berdych.  The problem is that Berdych and Tsonga will add any where from about 200-300 points after this week thus increasing the gap.  Almagro has the best chance but he generally does well on clay.  He lost very early in Beijing, so he’ll need to do some work on his least favorite surface.

After that, there are four players within fifty points of each other: Soderling, Simon, del Potro, and Tipsarevic.  Of these four, Soderling is in the most trouble.  First, it’s unclear when he’ll return to play or what form he will be in.  Second, and more importantly, Soderling won Paris last year and would be considered a long-shot to win it again.  This means he would need to gain points at other tournaments, and the soonest he’s likely to play is Stockholm.  Of the other three, del Potro seems like the one that has the chance to do the best, but he isn’t even in the Shanghai draw.

The one thing going for del Potro is that he’s not defending any points because he pretty much played 3 tournaments last year.  This makes it a bit dubious why he isn’t playing.  del Potro’s priorities may lie elsewhere, however.

This year, Argentina has, once again, reached the Davis Cup finals against Spain.  The last time they met, del Potro wasn’t even on the team.  This may have been due to some friction between him and Nalbandian which appears to be patched up.  Spain managed to beat Argentina in Argentina without Rafael Nadal.  This year, Nadal is expected to play.  del Potro may be sacrificing his chances in the year-end championship to gain additional time training for Davis Cup which will be held a week after the year-end championship.  They will desperately need del Potro to win both his matches although Nalbandian may be perfectly capable of beating Ferrer.  Doubles may become a huge factor in that tie.

With two Masters 1000 titles up for grabs, one of the 4-5 players outside the top 8 could make a big move.  The odds aren’t great, but Shanghai, for instance, is missing both Federer and Djokovic, so even a solid semifinal run could help someone make a positive move.

We have about a month or so to go, so it will be interesting to see who reaches London.