Changes to the tennis calendar that would make the game even better!

There has to be a Masters tournament on grass. Aussie open has to be shifted to later in the year to avoid the meaningless hard court events in the US before the FO. The Masters should be a warm up to the grand slams!

The calendar should be something like this. Look how logically the year can be divided into 5 seasons (tennis-wise) and gaps provided to make it easier for players.

This along with bringing back the variety on courts will make for an even more exciting tennis season!

Hardcourt season (slow hard courts)

Masters 1 (Indian Wells)
Masters 2 (Miami)

Australian Open

Clay court season

Masters 1 (Monte Carlo)
Masters 2 (Rome)

French Open

Grasscourt season

Grass Masters

Wimbledon

Second Hardcourt season (fast hard courts)

Masters 1 (Toronto/ Montreal)
Masters 2 (Cincinatti)

US Open

Indoor Hardcourt (Very fast hard courts) / Carpet season

Masters 1 (Shanghai)
Masters 2 (Paris)

World Tour Finals (previously Year Ending Cup)

The HC season should finish at the AO. It's too long alrady. I don't like IW and Miami. They should change their surface to either carpet like pace or something different like US clay.

I think they should add a grass court masters and take away one of the hardcourt masters events, most likely one of the 4 events in the US should be dropped. I am thinking cincy should be relegated down to a 500 pointer like WAshington DC. IW is in the heart of southern california a hotbed of tennis with a larger tv viewing and spectator market. Miami is also a more glitzy affair, and the canadians should have their only masters taken away. That leaves cincy as the sacrificial lamb for the grass court masters event. Wimby should be moved back a couple of weeks and the second US hardcourt season should be shorten by a couple of weeks. This will never happen by the way the politics of it will always cause it to bogged down in political bickering. No way cincy wants to lose its masters tag and the us broadcasters and their big money paycheck would fight tooth and nail.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/tennis/andymurray/8775284/Andy-Murray-worlds-leading-players-ready-to-strike.html


Shanghai to be the showdown!

This is exactly what annoys me with the top players. They have made the game a physical war and now they flag their white handkerchief.

And the rest of the players will suffer cause they'll have less tournaments to feed on.

Keep the tour as tough as it is. It allows the real talented players to make a difference!

Tenez wrote:This is exactly what annoys me with the top players. They have made the game a physical war and now they flag their white handkerchief.

And the rest of the players will suffer cause they'll have less tournaments to feed on.

Keep the tour as tough as it is. It allows the real talented players to make a difference!

Spot on!

Hilarious that those who have profited most by making the sport one of attrition are those wanting relief. Leave it as it is and allows people like Fish to clean up when the others can't compete.

Or maybe the players should be getting together to have voluntary restrictions on strings, racquets and the like? In your dreams!!

It's only really Nadal (61-11) and Djoko (64-3) who have played a mass of matches this year because they make finals so consistently - others have barely got into the 50's, and surely a season of 70 or so matches is attainable.

The ATP season is very difficult to juggle with - not least because of all the vested interests with different tournaments and associations all over the world and gearing up the timetable to help a couple of players who may end up playing between 80 and 90 matches at cost to a lot of other players and tournaments seems a bit short-term.

I'd like to see IW/Miami moved back a couple of weeks to spread out th European clay season. But if that's not possible, the solution for the top players would seem to be to drop out a few 500's and 250's and even MC (a voluntary 1,000) if there are too many tournaments. That may leave a slight over-balance in favour of hardcourts and the USA - but if that is where the money lies let's see some of the turkeys voting for Christmas.

I will wait and see with interest if Nadal plays Tokyo, which is on his schedule (Barcelona was back on for him this year too and Djoko played his own tournament in Serbia).

I think they should do away with the grasscourt season. No one will miss Wimbledon

Tenez wrote:This is exactly what annoys me with the top players. They have made the game a physical war and now they flag their white handkerchief.

And the rest of the players will suffer cause they'll have less tournaments to feed on.

Keep the tour as tough as it is. It allows the real talented players to make a difference!

NO, NO, NO! The ATP/ITF have MADE the game more physical by slowing the conditions down - dont BLAME the players!

And then you oxymoron yourself by saying "allow the talented players to make a difference" when you keep bleating on here about how the talented players [like Federer] dont get the same look in anymore due to the physical players taking over with slower conditions! Remember - your argument about longer ralleys making the 'talented' guys like Federer run out of puff? You can't have it both ways!

Your whole mantra has been:
Slow conditions = physical player
Fast conditions = talented player

And now you say "keep the tour as it is".

Hilarious, make your mind up man!

GillesSimon wrote:I think they should do away with the grasscourt season. No one will miss Wimbledon

Oh Murray would, it's the only slam where he's guaranteed to have chicken nugget opponents until is inevitable semi embarrassment.

GillesSimon wrote:I think they should do away with the grasscourt season. No one will miss Wimbledon

The grass court season is a blink and you'll miss it one anyway.

Far too many clay court tournaments for my liking so crap the French (only joking) - or at least one of the numerous clay court events leading up to it.

Actually (and this would be contentious) do away with the Aussie Open or, better still if they can't get their act together, the US one so one hard court slam as one slam's plenty enough on hard courts thank you very much.

I'd like to see Rome or Monte Carlo as a grass event, keep it as a 1000 event just change the surface, one less clay event and bobs your uncle.

lydian wrote:

Tenez wrote:This is exactly what annoys me with the top players. They have made the game a physical war and now they flag their white handkerchief.

And the rest of the players will suffer cause they'll have less tournaments to feed on.

Keep the tour as tough as it is. It allows the real talented players to make a difference!

NO, NO, NO! The ATP/ITF have MADE the game more physical by slowing the conditions down - dont BLAME the players!

And then you oxymoron yourself by saying "allow the talented players to make a difference" when you keep bleating on here about how the talented players [like Federer] dont get the same look in anymore due to the physical players taking over with slower conditions! Remember - your argument about longer ralleys making the 'talented' guys like Federer run out of puff? You can't have it both ways!

Your whole mantra has been:
Slow conditions = physical player
Fast conditions = talented player

And now you say "keep the tour as it is".

Hilarious, make your mind up man!

Looks like you dont get it. The courts have slowed down but less than a handful of players are exploiting those slower conditions to the extreme to the point of altering their game to thrive on those conditions. They are the same players who go as far as bending the rules to allow their physical game to dominate on those slow conds.

And I certainly would prefer to have faster conditions, but seeing this year the player, who kept pushing the physicality of the game, getting a taste of his own medecine makes me smile. And I am not that bothered to see two players looking to destroy each other physically both ending limping in that USO final.

You live by the sword, you die by the sword.

Also I have never been in favour to shorten the season. an extra week or 2 over Xmas certainly but no more.

Yes that would be a good idea Josiah, maybe give Monte carlo a chance to be a mandatory masters event by going to grass and take place immediately after RG and right before queens and halle, you would have to move wimby back a couple of weeks the weather would be better anyway with less rain I assume.

Josiah Maiestas wrote:I'd like to see Rome or Monte Carlo as a grass event, keep it as a 1000 event just change the surface, one less clay event and bobs your uncle.

I like that clay season. Especially if they play it with faster balls like at the French.

What I don;t like is this eternal HC season. More so IW and Miami. WHat's teh point of having 2 masters following each other on HC when all the players want to play on clay.

Well tenez you have to consider the business end of things. IW is the biggest tournament on the west coast of the states it is an hour and half away from LA, San diego, and orange county where 20 million on average affluent residents live and after NY, the second biggest tv market in the states. Miami has also become a real glitzy affair and is geographically like the grandslam of the south and the burgeoning florida market. Both Ca and Florida have good weather that time of year and are the two main breeding grounds for players. I really don't understand cincy, if I was going to eliminate one of the hardcourt masters it would be cincy. No where near the market size of CA or FLorida, terrible weather, and as we saw this year players kind of are giving out at that point of the season then having to play in the 90 percent humidity of cincy in august.

[quote="Tennisanorak"]There has to be a Masters tournament on grass. Aussie open has to be shifted to later in the year to avoid the meaningless hard court events in the US before the FO. The Masters should be a warm up to the grand slams!

The calendar should be something like this. Look how logically the year can be divided into 5 seasons (tennis-wise) and gaps provided to make it easier for players.

This along with bringing back the variety on courts will make for an even more exciting tennis season!

[b]Hardcourt season (slow hard courts)[/b]

Masters 1 (Indian Wells)
Masters 2 (Miami)

Australian Open

[b]Clay court season[/b]

Masters 1 (Monte Carlo)
Masters 2 (Rome)

French Open

[b]Grasscourt season[/b]

Grass Masters

Wimbledon

[b]Second Hardcourt season (fast hard courts)[/b]

Masters 1 (Toronto/ Montreal)
Masters 2 (Cincinatti)

US Open

[b]Indoor Hardcourt (Very fast hard courts) / Carpet season [/b]

Masters 1 (Shanghai)
Masters 2 (Paris)

World Tour Finals (previously Year Ending Cup)
[/quote]


I like your schedule TA. simple, logical.

One thing that MUST be avoided at all cost, is back to back masters, esp on hard courts. I mean the moron who dreamt them should be sacked!

I like the clay court season too

I think the schedule is ok as it is.

It's not perfect, but with all the commercial pressures and the need to find a 'one size fits all' scenario, I think it's reasonable as it is.

What annoys me about the constant moaning from The Nadull is that he then goes and plays additional tournaments like Barca or the Asian swing tournaments that he doesn't need to play.

Didn't they already change the DC schedule to accommodate the players, and now they're complaining again!

It's all very well for the likes of The Nadull and Murray to complain about too many tournaments, but what about the players in the lower echelons of the tour?

They need to make a living. They need at least 25-30 tournaments each year to be able to make a decent living and to play enough matches to stay sharp.

Most of these guys lose in the 1st or 2nd round. I think it's pure selfishness on the part of a handful of top players.

Instead of complaining so much about the tour they should learn to play a more efficient game. After all Federer played 85 matches in 05, and 97 matches in 06!

An 80 match season has been standard fare for the top players for decades.

I'm with Stich:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/tennis/14985897.stm

Hopefully more former and active top players will react like this on the strike threats. They're seriously not connected to the real world

Bottom line, Murray has made a fool of himself over this, and incidentally caused embarressment to this country by advertising to the World that there's a certain strand of thinking here that jumps to aggressive action when discussions haven't even begun.

As you say emancipator, the complaints are all coming from the players whose style is to run around all day and exhaust the opponent.

Pathetic.

If the top 3 and Murray don`t want to play as many tournaments then don`t play them, but don`t stop the average player earning his lower amount. Not all tennis players are multi millionaires with sponsers galore, most do it to MAKE a living.

The biggest enemy is probably the Masters Series and the "star culture". Every Masters Tournament is desperate to have the top players duking it out - otherwise they can't justify their ranking status, their prize money, and their advertising and so on. They are also desperate for the top players to get through to the latter rounds.

The ATP therefore needs tough rules to ensure all the best players go - so there are 12-13 tough tournaments a year which really take it out of the top players. When you look at big years from the likes of Connors and Mac they were winning relatively smaller tournaments on surfaces that suited them.

This causes the smaller tournaments and the DC to suffer - so the ATP has introduced rules in an attempt to get players to spread their largesse a bit to the smaller tournaments.

If I were making a really big change it would be to reduce the status of a few Masters Series Tournaments and to relax the rules so that players could pick and chose a bit more. We'd miss out on the regular sight of the top 4 coming to a big tournament and the bigger non-slam tournaments woudl be much less rich affairs, but still be allowed to exist. Oh, and the top players would probably make less money (you'd need to keep a tightish lid on appearance money in my system).

I don't expect to see it.

Making Monte Carlo a non compulsory event doesn't seem to have hurt it at all. Perhaps a couple of other hardcourt Masters could be given equal status, for instance Miami and Cincinatti? They would still be guaranteed top players, but maybe the top four would be spread between IW and M and Roger's Cup and C. They would still attract the best because of the ranking points and prize money on offer.

barrystar wrote:

If I were making a really big change it would be to reduce the status of a few Masters Series Tournaments and to relax the rules so that players could pick and chose a bit more. We'd miss out on the regular sight of the top 4 coming to a big tournament and the bigger non-slam tournaments woudl be much less rich affairs, but still be allowed to exist. Oh, and the top players would probably make less money (you'd need to keep a tightish lid on appearance money in my system).

I don't expect to see it.

Yes, good point but I believe the benefit of TMS though is to prevent probably too many tournaments using the invitation fee to attract the best players at the expense of a proper uniformity of the field. Look at what happens in the 500 and 250 tournaments. They spend all their money in getting teh big names and don;t mind filling the gaps with local players. The TMS are a kind of a backbone to the ATP circuit. It needs to be enforced to make tennis resemble a proper competitive sport.

And I am not a big fan of the TMS concept actually. I preferred in the Lendl/McEnroe time. What they probably need to do though is to make tennis less physical. That is essentially the main priority imo.

I agree with your sentiments Tenez - but players, or at least top players, and tournaments alike will probably not want to make tennis less physical.

The public are still ooing and aahing at long rallies and impossible gets, and the top players are getting through to the SF's and F's of big tournaments far more regulalry than they used to because they have more opportunity to impose themselves in the matches, meaning that the punters get to see the players they want on TV and at the ground during the weekends.

Introducing more of a 'crap-shoot' element, which would see 'shocks' more regularly, as used to happen, is not likely to make the money men happy.

barrystar wrote:I agree with your sentiments Tenez - but players, or at least top players, and tournaments alike will probably not want to make tennis less physical.

The public are still ooing and aahing at long rallies and impossible gets, and the top players are getting through to the SF's and F's of big tournaments far more regulalry than they used to because they have more opportunity to impose themselves in the matches, meaning that the punters get to see the players they want on TV and at the ground during the weekends.

Introducing more of a 'crap-shoot' element, which would see 'shocks' more regularly, as used to happen, is not likely to make the money men happy.

Sure. Good point but the stars woudl simply be different stars under different conds. I can easily see the crowd warming up to a Dolgo and its flashy shots and then playing a diva and capricious character mocking the terrestrial games of of those physical players, like a bullfighter v the bull.

Tennis was very popular in the past too, even, and maybe because of the many upsets. we just need flamboyant players. We have a bit of that already when watching Fed v Djoko or Fed v Tsonga. Didn't we see a standing ovation recently at 1am for a straight 3 setter between Fed and Monaco?

Tenez wrote:This is exactly what annoys me with the top players. They have made the game a physical war and now they flag their white handkerchief.

And the rest of the players will suffer cause they'll have less tournaments to feed on.

Keep the tour as tough as it is. It allows the real talented players to make a difference!

Agreed

Its not yet clear what the players want. Murray has been talking to the media but he isn't even on the players council. The ATP players council should meet and figure out what improvements they would like before involving the press and making threats. Judging by how even the top players couldn't agree on the decision to move the US Open final to Monday getting an agreement might not be easy.

Murray talking like this about "strikes" has so far met with the public response it deserves. Poor little rich kids... I agree it puts tennis players in a bad light. Hasn't Murray got PR people to keep him under control...

Murray talking like this about "strikes" has so far met with the public response it deserves. Poor little rich kids... I agree it puts tennis players in a bad light. Hasn't Murray got PR people to keep him under control...

Sad thing is the guy has never had to play against amateur players on the futures circuit so he doesn't understand the meaning of 'struggle'. His moaning will only be an adverse effect on his game, fortunately there are far more skilled players taking no notice of any strike and will soon replace him..