Tiriac, de Villiers Talk Combined Events, Round Robins
Posted on October 18, 2006ATP President Etienne de Villiers and ATP Madrid promoter Ion Tiriac held a press conference in Madrid to speak to the future of men's tennis, especially regarding future combined men's and women's events, and experimental round robin tournaments for 2007.
"Ion and his team would very much like the opportunity to consider the Madrid venue, the team that has put on this great tournament to provide Madrid with a combined event," de villiers said. "As much as I would like to give that to Madrid, I can't. It is a process that will be subject to several very, very worthy other cities and tournaments. Rome has staged an Italian Open for 100 years. It has great tradition in its favor, and they would be very interested in staging a combined event. As would Monte Carlo. So there are at least three contenders for this position...We plan to have four combined events in total. The two that exist in North America, one in the U.S., in fact. We wish to see one go into the period just leading into the French Open, two weeks before the French Open.
de Villiers also addressed the somewhat controversial round robin events, which the ATP plans to experiment with in different formats and draw sizes for 2007.
"We have introduced and have had the rules passed by the board for round robin and for a Sunday start," de Villiers said. "We think the two go hand in hand. It's very hard to arrange a round robin event without an eighth day. We're going to experiment next year with a number of formats. 32 draw, 24 draw, 48 draw. We've invited tournaments to volunteer. And we're in the process of evaluating how many of those tournaments and the nature of these tournaments before we make a final decision. But we probably will have a good 12 tournaments or so and maybe more next year experimenting...We want to introduce most of the changes in the structure of the tour, the combined events and everything like that will come about in 2009. So we have time now to promote the sport, to promote players, to experiment with these changes, to see fan reaction, to gauge the economic impacts of these. So that when we do roll out 2009, we'll have a lot of information so that hopefully we won't screw up."
Tiriac offered a rambling soliloquy during the press conference, touching on subjects such as making progress in tennis, slowing down the game, the emergence of China, and 'putting Grand Slam money on the table.'
"Listen, there are bad things and good things when the government changes," Tiriac began. "The government changes in Spain. This government is doing different things than the old government. The government change in ATP, maybe it's good, maybe it's bad...That for good or bad, they are committed to do some changes that they didn't have the guts to do in tennis...The game is too fast. Yeah, I think it's too fast. I always say it's too fast. Can the game be fixed? It's mathematical. You make the ball 10 percent bigger, everything is going to be slowed down...Round robin, I was ready for a round robin 40 years ago...When they say yes, we want two Masters Series combined or extended in Europe. It might be an interesting thing because you cannot ignore China. It doesn't matter what you do, you don't ignore it anymore, even in tennis. They don't have a tennis player. I bet anything you look in the next 10 or 15 years, they are going to have a bloody tennis player. They'll make one in a machine somewhere. They'll get the know how and they'll make one no problem whatsoever...I am prepared to put the prize money of a Grand Slam tomorrow. Let's go start one and do it as well. Let's see if we are competing on commercial terms. Let's see if we are competing on sport terms and so on. But how Mr. Chairman say it, it's going to be an open system. It's going to be an open bidding, transparent."
Wrapping up, Tiriac pointed to the 'good old days' of tennis being a game of strategy rather than who can hit the other player off the court (translation alert ahead).
"It was more interesting," Tiriac said of the pre-super-racquet days. "It was a game of chess. You put the ball there, the ball is coming here, you put the ball there and so on. I do not believe that I am going to make, I am going to make another compliment that in my lifetime I saw, and I saw almost everybody, even the people that played in the 1800's, a better player than Federer. A better technician than Federer. And all the dimensions being concerned. Laver being considered from Roosevelt to Sampras to anybody. How those guys manipulates a tennis racket. And then I give him an extra at these speeds. So what this guy would have done with this racket on another circuit. Just close your eyes and remember here 30 years ago, putting here, coming here, coming there, coming there. I saw Ilie Nastase's father playing a tennis game out of the court. The court was free and there was so much anticipation on both of them that they played out of the court. Those things are gone. Everybody is hitting the ball as hard as they can."
"Ion and his team would very much like the opportunity to consider the Madrid venue, the team that has put on this great tournament to provide Madrid with a combined event," de villiers said. "As much as I would like to give that to Madrid, I can't. It is a process that will be subject to several very, very worthy other cities and tournaments. Rome has staged an Italian Open for 100 years. It has great tradition in its favor, and they would be very interested in staging a combined event. As would Monte Carlo. So there are at least three contenders for this position...We plan to have four combined events in total. The two that exist in North America, one in the U.S., in fact. We wish to see one go into the period just leading into the French Open, two weeks before the French Open.
de Villiers also addressed the somewhat controversial round robin events, which the ATP plans to experiment with in different formats and draw sizes for 2007.
"We have introduced and have had the rules passed by the board for round robin and for a Sunday start," de Villiers said. "We think the two go hand in hand. It's very hard to arrange a round robin event without an eighth day. We're going to experiment next year with a number of formats. 32 draw, 24 draw, 48 draw. We've invited tournaments to volunteer. And we're in the process of evaluating how many of those tournaments and the nature of these tournaments before we make a final decision. But we probably will have a good 12 tournaments or so and maybe more next year experimenting...We want to introduce most of the changes in the structure of the tour, the combined events and everything like that will come about in 2009. So we have time now to promote the sport, to promote players, to experiment with these changes, to see fan reaction, to gauge the economic impacts of these. So that when we do roll out 2009, we'll have a lot of information so that hopefully we won't screw up."
Tiriac offered a rambling soliloquy during the press conference, touching on subjects such as making progress in tennis, slowing down the game, the emergence of China, and 'putting Grand Slam money on the table.'
"Listen, there are bad things and good things when the government changes," Tiriac began. "The government changes in Spain. This government is doing different things than the old government. The government change in ATP, maybe it's good, maybe it's bad...That for good or bad, they are committed to do some changes that they didn't have the guts to do in tennis...The game is too fast. Yeah, I think it's too fast. I always say it's too fast. Can the game be fixed? It's mathematical. You make the ball 10 percent bigger, everything is going to be slowed down...Round robin, I was ready for a round robin 40 years ago...When they say yes, we want two Masters Series combined or extended in Europe. It might be an interesting thing because you cannot ignore China. It doesn't matter what you do, you don't ignore it anymore, even in tennis. They don't have a tennis player. I bet anything you look in the next 10 or 15 years, they are going to have a bloody tennis player. They'll make one in a machine somewhere. They'll get the know how and they'll make one no problem whatsoever...I am prepared to put the prize money of a Grand Slam tomorrow. Let's go start one and do it as well. Let's see if we are competing on commercial terms. Let's see if we are competing on sport terms and so on. But how Mr. Chairman say it, it's going to be an open system. It's going to be an open bidding, transparent."
Wrapping up, Tiriac pointed to the 'good old days' of tennis being a game of strategy rather than who can hit the other player off the court (translation alert ahead).
"It was more interesting," Tiriac said of the pre-super-racquet days. "It was a game of chess. You put the ball there, the ball is coming here, you put the ball there and so on. I do not believe that I am going to make, I am going to make another compliment that in my lifetime I saw, and I saw almost everybody, even the people that played in the 1800's, a better player than Federer. A better technician than Federer. And all the dimensions being concerned. Laver being considered from Roosevelt to Sampras to anybody. How those guys manipulates a tennis racket. And then I give him an extra at these speeds. So what this guy would have done with this racket on another circuit. Just close your eyes and remember here 30 years ago, putting here, coming here, coming there, coming there. I saw Ilie Nastase's father playing a tennis game out of the court. The court was free and there was so much anticipation on both of them that they played out of the court. Those things are gone. Everybody is hitting the ball as hard as they can."