The waters of tennis go down in turmoil. While the ATP strives to improve conditions for players amid pressure from the union led by Novak Djokovic, the four Grand Slams are cooking up a revolution on the circuit. All this, with Saudi Arabia and its infinite checkbook singing siren songs in the background.
After filling its football league with stars – from Cristiano Ronaldo to Karim Benzema and Neymar – and shaking up golf again with the signing of Jon Rahm for its circuit, Saudi Arabia is determined to land in the world of tennis. It was already in negotiations to host the WTA Finals and a few weeks ago it hosted its first ATP tournament, the Next Gen Finals, in Jeddah. an event that brings together the eight best young people. But that is a minor detail compared to what you want to achieve..
Saudi Arabia wants a Masters 1000, the second most important category of tournaments on the circuit, only behind the big four, Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon and US Open. The problem, of course, is how to fit all the pieces together: as The Athletic published in early November, eThe Gulf country would be interested in buying the license for the Mutua Madrid Open or the Miami Masters 1000. Both events are owned by giant IMG.
Saudi Arabia will not buy the Madrid license
¿Is Madrid at risk of losing the tournament it has hosted since 2002? Feliciano Lopez, director of the Mutua Madrid Openyou are sure not. He admits that the tentacles of Arabia will end up reaching tennis sooner or later, but he assures that the formula is to add a Masters 1000 to the calendar and not to replace one with another.
“Arabia has a great intention to enter tennis. They have a huge project at the sporting level of international expansion. They have started with soccer, golf, they want to get into tennis. Saudi is investing very heavily in sport in general. It is not something specific to a specific sport,” the former tennis player told Relevo during the Spanish Olympic Committee gala held on Friday in Madrid.
“In tennis what they want is to get a Masters 1000. They have had the Next Gen recently, which was the first test. And now they want to have a Masters and they are pursuing it,” added Feliciano López. “The ATP is deciding whether to award this Masters 1000 and is talking to all parties involved. But it would be adding one more Masters 1000 to the calendar. It would be the tenth. “You have to find the week because the tennis world calendar is not the easiest in the world.”
One of the possibilities on the table is that Arabia hosts that tenth Masters 1000 in January, before the Australian Open. This was stated a few weeks ago by the president of the Italian Federation, Angelo Binaghi, in an interview with Corriere della Sera, in which he spoke of 2025 as the starting date. EThe plan, however, would radically clash with the interests of Australia, one of the most important and influential federations in the world of tennis.
Owner of the Australian Open, the Aussie federation is not interested in adding a major tournament in January, since that would damage the tour prior to the first Grand Slam of the year. This season, for example, three ATP and five WTA tournaments are being held in Australia in the weeks leading up to the Open.
The possibility of a “premium circuit”
Australia’s plans, in fact, seem to go the other way. In other information published by The Athletic at the end of November, it was known thatThe big four are preparing a revolution: they want a premium circuit that would encompass the Grand Slam and the Masters 1000. That caught many people in tennis on the wrong foot. Feliciano López had no idea.
“Many people who work in the tennis industry were surprised because we had not heard anything. I had been in Turin a week before at the ATP year-end meetings. All the directors of all the tournaments in the world were there. And we wrote to each other surprised by that news,” the director of the Mutua Madrid Open explained to Relevo. “It was strange and strange how it came to be published, where it came from… we don’t understand very well. because we hadn’t heard anything.”
“Tennis is in good shape. We have been growing for ten years at all levels, the challenger circuit has greatly increased the prize money and the tournaments pay more and more. The Grand Slams in the last ten years have contributed a lot to this increase in prizes,” added Feli, who does not see many reasons to change the current system. “It is true that the tennis player always wants more and there is room to improve things further. . I have the experience of having been able to play for many years and I have been able to see that tennis has changed a lot. Good work has been done and we are in a good situation“.
Nacho Encabo is a sports editor at Relevo, a specialist in tennis and the Olympic Games. Born in Madrid, he studied Journalism and Audiovisual Communication at the Rey Juan Carlos University and began as an intern in the sports section of El Mundo in 2011. Knowing German shortly after opened the doors of the dpa agency, where he worked as a special envoy to the 2012 London Olympic Games and the 2014 Sochi Winter Games, the 2016 Euro Cup in France and the 2018 World Cup in Russia. In addition, adding Relay and the rest of his career, he has covered the four Grand Slams of tennis, the Davis Cup , athletics world championships, Formula 1 Grand Prix and countless LaLiga and Champions League matches. He has also worked as a reporter at El Independiente and traveled to the Tokyo Olympics on the Spanish Olympic Committee team. …
2023-12-18 11:17:56
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