TENNIS in DEPTH.

For some reason we have all been hood-winked by the equal pay syndrome expounded by feminists and liberal minded fair play supporters. I include myself in this second group because I believe in the equality of the sexes, and for equal pay for equal job performance. But the key word in the equation is equal performance. If I had paid $480 for a ticket to the women’s final I would be pissed off. Serena won because of the lack of competition, she is so much better than all the other players, with her sister being an exception, and yet, until the final she didn’t have to play at much more than 50% of her potential. She played one good set against Dementieva, and two good sets against Safina, and walked of with a cool $1.2 million! She was on the court for a total time of about 13 hours for the entire tournament. Whichever of the men win in the men’s final, they will have spent more than twice the amount of time on court than Serena, and yet they will take home the same prize money. Is it fair? No. Was a ticket to the Nadal/Verdasco match worth the money? Yes. Is the prize money amount irrelevant to the degree of entertainment supplied, and only equalized because it is politically correct?
Golf professionals are often compared to tennis professionals, neither receives a salary or a contract, they only get paid if they win. In a few instances the prize money for a women’s event is comparable to the mens, but the Grand Slams are not combined, the LPGA stands alone on their own two feet and does not benefit directly from the PGA. Why should tennis be any different? In golf the women play the same number of rounds and the same number of holes, maybe the course is a little shorter, but in all other aspects it is the same.
In tennis the women play best of 3 sets while the men play best of 5 sets, so shouldn’t their compensation be 3/5th’s of the mens compensation?
The answer has to do with entertainment value, and who will pay for a ticket to watch tennis live or on TV. There can be no argument that men tennis players are stronger, faster and better than their female counterparts, and if it is great tennis that the public wants to see, then the men’s game is the choice. But if the public choice is to see pretty, fist-pumping women in designer clothes, some with diamonds and jewels befitting a queen adorning their bodies, perspiring and acting like drama queens, then this too has a huge entertainment value.
So ask yourself this question. Are you a tennis watcher or a people watcher?

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Indian youngster Yuki Bhambri turned in a dominating performance to beat Germany

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Serena Williams has won her fourth Australian Open title following an utterly masterful mauling of Russian Dinara Safina.

The American blitzed the No. 3 seed 6-0 6-3 in under an hour, smacking 23 winners and four aces while committing just seven unforced errors.

From the first point, Williams looked amazingly sharp, her groundstrokes grooved, serve dominant and return devastating.

Safina had no answer to Williams

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Second seeds Bob and Mike Bryan will contest their fifth straight Australian Open final against third seeds Mark Knowles and Mahesh Bhupathi, who will be appearing in their first Grand Slam championship title-match, on Saturday.

The Bryan twins defeated fourth seeds Lukas Dlouhy and Leander Paes 6-3, 6-3 in 54 minutes on the Hisense Arena, in what was a repeat of the 2008 US Open final. Dlouhy and Paes committed nine unforced errors, as the Bryans converted five of eight break point opportunities.

The 30-year-old Californians finished runner-up in 2004 (l. to Llodra-Santoro) and 2005 (l. to Black-Ullyett) and won back-to-back titles in 2006 (d. Damm-Paes) and 2007 (d. Bjorkman-Mirnyi).

They are currently fourth in the all-time doubles Grand Slam title leaders of the Open Era behind Australians John Newcombe and Tony Roche (7), Americans Peter Fleming and John McEnroe (7) and Australians Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde (11).

The Bryans opened their 2009 ATP World Tour season by capturing their 50th ATP World Tour title at the Medibank International in Sydney (d. Nestor-Zimonjic). They are only the fourth team in the Open Era to win at least 50 titles, joining Woodbridge-Woodforde (61), Fleming-McEnroe (57), and Bob Hewitt and Frew McMillan (57).

Knowles and Bhupathi earned a comfortable 6-3, 6-1 win against the unseeded Polish-Austrian duo of Lukasz Kubot and Oliver Marach. They raced out to a 3-0 lead in the opening set, and then capitalised on three of their four break point chances in the second set to secure the victory in 58 minutes.

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