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The London experience should be the template for the future.

by bahamaderek on Dec.02, 2009, under ATP

The 2009 tennis season is finally over, and the pundits have misanalysed every player’s performance, offered their advice, voiced their opinions, and written articulate phrases to describe or condone every move that the players made during the course of a very successful year.

I’m not qualified to offer advice, nor do I presume to be an expert on the game, except as a spectator and fan. As a fan, I enjoyed the ATP Finals in London, the round robin format, the high quality level of the tennis, and the simple pleasure of seeing match after match played by the very best players. I have to pose the question, why don’t we see more of this type of event?

Wasn’t it a better test of tennis for a player such as Federer to be forced to play 4 matches against 4 ‘real’ opponents rather than to see him play 6 matches in a Grand Slam against just one or two worthy combatants?

From a fan’s perspective, and all the seats were sold out, there were no ‘garbage’ matches, no warm-ups for the top players at the fan’s expense, no walk-in-the-park offerings that give tennis its boring reputation, plus the additional benefit of a reduction in the court time for the players. Every match was a kin to a quarter or semi final, and the results reflected the competitiveness.

I’m all for dividing the ATP and WTA rankings into tiers of eight to twelve players, and the individual players would move up or down according to their match results within their tier. Top two up, and bottom two down, just like Soccer, the Fed Cup or the Davis Cup.

Tennis is due for some changes to make it more fan friendly, the traditional 5- 6 hour matches of Grand Slams are boring until the end, TV schedules are often disrupted, and Tennis remains as an elite sport supported by a core of frustrated weekend players.

Remuneration for players outside of the top 30 is barely enough for them to be able to continue in their profession without sponsor support. A tiered tournament could be structured to increase the prize money for those players who win and move up, instead of he or she being defeated in the first round by a top ten player and going home in debt.

With the sharp increase in injuries in 2009, the complaints from some players about the length of the season, and the separation of the top players from all the others, it is time to think about making some changes.

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1 Comment for this entry

  • barracuda firewall
    December 24th, 2009 on 7:43 pm

    I’m impressed! I found your blog on yahoo searching for something totally unrelated, and now I’m gonna have to go through the old posts! Good bye my spare time today, but this was a great find :)


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