The Sony Ericsson WTA Tour has announced that--as part of its "marketing" plan and its plan to "enhance player health"--all doubles matches will involve a super-tiebreak instead of a 3rd set, and there will be no ad point. In other words, doubles play is to be destroyed. The idea is not original: The ATP has already destroyed doubles by using this format.
Taking the excitement out of doubles in order to market it is totally backasswards. There is no tennis without an ad point, and the super-tiebreak is a terrible idea.
This is quite disappointing and I think the logic behind the changes are faulty. People who are mild tennis fans will probably not turn to doubles and those of us who are avid fans will be quite upset by the watered down format.
ReplyDeleteI know the Bryan brothers were challenging format changes on the ATP tour. What ever came of that? Any hopes people like Lisa Raymond, Cara Black, Sam Stosur, etc. will put up a similar fight?
The Bryan Brothers' pleas were ignored, the last I heard.
ReplyDeleteI think the person most likely to create a fuss in the WTA is Rennae Stubbs; she made it clear years ago what she thought of the idea when it was first proposed. I suspect that Raymond and Stosur may also complain.
An interesting (and disappointing) note on this whole thing: The idea for watered-down doubles was also proposed years ago by Martina Navratilova.