The Spanish team plays at Valencia. Italy plays at Bologna. The United Kingdom plays at Manchester. But In Zhuhai, just a few kilometres from Hong Kong, China is not present. This is the latest nonsense of the International Tennis Federation with the Davis Cup.
What is the point of having the United States, Germany, Chile and Slovakia play the group stage in China? They say at the ITF that it is a way to expand the boundaries of tennis, but the fact of having chosen a venue without the hosts, which It is on average more than 11,000 kilometres from the four nations that make up Group C, and with schedules that make it difficult to follow the action. Live from the participating countries, suggests that the real reason is economic.
Players from both Europe and Latin America They expressed to CLAY your disagreement“It’s a disaster,” said Chilean Christian Garín. “I’ve been feeling for a while that the Davis Cup has lost what it had. The times we’ve played in Chile we’ve played in a full stadium and an incredible atmosphere. Now they’re putting us in China… I have played thousands of tournaments in China and there is never anyone there. There will be no spectators. The Davis Cup has always been a very emotional competition, and now being played in China it will be anything but.“.
“It’s not ideal to play in a country where the host nation is not competing,” said Germany’s Kevin Krawietz during the US Open. He and Tim Puetz contested the men’s doubles final in New York on Saturday, travelled to Zhuhai the next day and made their debut with a win over the Slovaks on Tuesday. “I think it affects the team. I can’t understand how this is positive for the Davis Cup.”“Puetz added.
Stars don’t travel to China
The location of the venue was the main reason why the big names who could be nominated chose not to play. The absence of top tennis players is one of the biggest problems that the competition has always had to deal with, before and after The revolution that Gerard Piqué’s arrival represented for the format in 2018. But after the departure of Kosmos, the footballer’s company, in January 2023, things have not changed for the moment either.
Several of the big stars who could have been in China this week will travel to Berlin in the next few days to compete in the Laver Cup. This is the case of Alexander Zverev and Jan-Lennard Struff for Germany; Taylor Fritz, Frances Tiafoe, Tommy Paul, Sebastian Korda and Ben Shelton for the United States.
Thus, andThe German number one in China is Yannick Hanfmann (94th in the world; fifth German in the ATP rankings)and the best American singles player is Brandon Nakashima (39th; sixth American). Slovakia traveled with its starters. Chile also brought its entire team.
The captain of the Chilean team, Nicolás Massú has often been critical of the choice of venues for the Davis Cup finals in its new formatand the neglect of regions such as South America, as well as the constant choice of hard indoor courts, which are not very favourable for his team. Massú opted to “see the glass half full and concentrate 100% on what happens on the court.”
China’s role in world tennis
“I think our role as the ITF is to grow tennis around the world. And “China is actually the nation with the most amateur tennis players on the planet,” David Haggerty told CLAY.the president of the governing body of world tennis.
That’s true. According to ITF studies, China has more than a fifth of the world’s 87 million tennis players among its population.Haggerty called the claim that money was the real reason for bringing part of the Davis Cup finals to the Asian country “not necessarily accurate.”
“China is showing that its interest in tennis is growing very fast. Now, if you go there, you see that the fans are very enthusiastic, passionate, and many of them are tennis players. “We work with nations to bring fans from their countries to the series. It’s about having good marketing and being creative, to get more traveling fans to attend,” he said.
“Last year in Malaga we had a spectacular atmosphere even though Spain had not qualified, many fans came, local and international,” added the American, when questioned during Wimbledon, shortly after the draw was announced.
How I explain Tennis to friends:
“🇩🇪 plays the world cup groupe stage in China vs Slovakia 2 days after the US Open Final without their best 3,4 players. The doubles players played a final 50 hours ago in NY and took the 1 flight around the World. No one cares”
📸@ChipundCharge pic.twitter.com/joLZmcr5bN— Jannik Schneider (@schnejan) September 10, 2024
Craig Tiley, the Australian Open director and former South Africa Davis Cup captain, has always been against neutral venues in Davis, as he stressed in a recent interview on CLAY: “Playing home games and having the crowd completely behind you… the energy of those games. That’s why I’ve always been in favour of playing at home and away, and I still am. “I think the Davis Cup should have more home-and-away matches. And I think they just have to decide how often and how it would be commercially. (…) We should have worked harder to find a commercial solution for that issue.”
In southern China, at the Hengqin International Tennis Center, with Germans and Slovaks opening the action on neutral ground, It was shown that the enthusiasm of the locals is not as great when third and fourth-rate tennis players representing foreign nations are on the court. Half-empty stands. Nostalgia for what Davis was like.
