Andy Murray has entered the debate over the value of the tennis world rankings by questioning the Williams sisters’ interest in tournaments outside the grand slams.
The rise of Russian Dinara Safina to No 1 has raised the question of whether it is justifiable for a player without a grand slam title to be on top. Serena Williams has won three of the last four grand slam women’s singles titles, however she only stands at No. 2 in the WTA Tour standings. Men’s world No. 2 Murray, who has also still yet to win one of the four top tournaments in tennis, believes there would be little merit in raising the points on offer at the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and US Open just to ensure the winners of those events have a better chance of topping the rankings.
Murray understands why the issue is being discussed, and why there are varying views, but he is convinced the ranking systems as they stand have plenty of merit.
The Scot said:
“Do you not agree that it’s important for the top players like Serena to turn up at the other big events? “Tennis (has) an 11-month calendar. If you have ranking points which are too small for Serena to turn up at some of the smaller events, then all of a sudden the whole calendar is completely pointless and she can turn up — which is probably what she wants to do — at the four slams and play, and then not play for the rest of the year. And I think you have to be rewarded for consistency, and her consistency in slams is great, but in the other tournaments I don’t think it is.”
Today, we have some exciting news for our readers. One of our partner sites, TennisAssist.com, has confirmed an interview with one of tennis greatest players, John Newcombe.
Overall, John has won 26 Grand Slam major titles in singles, doubles, and mixed doubles. Every reader has the opportunity to have your questions answered by John himself. A former ATP player Peter Tramacchi will be interviewing John on the 14th of August.
To submit your question place a comment on this blog post. If you like – provide us your Name and What country and Area you are from so Pete can introduce your personal question to John. Also if relevant mention your age. For example – You might ask about Nerves and how he felt before a Grand Slam Final, you might like to ask about improving your game – and if so include your standard and age. How about a question about Federer winning the recent Grand Slams?
As most of you have already noticed we have added a new image to our sidebar here at The Tennis Times. The aim of this image is to show our readers how many people have been attending the Grand Slams for 2009, and then just for good measure we have added how many people have visited The Tennis Times for 2009. I thought this would just be an interesting addition and we are aiming to beat all Grand Slams by the end of 2009!
Sweden’s Jonas Bjorkman has bowed out of professional tennis after a glittering 17 year career that earned him nine Grand Slam doubles titles.
Bjorkman, 36, was treated to a special ceremony at Qi Zhong Stadium after he and partner Kevin Ullyett were knocked out of the Tennis Masters Cup doubles.
“They reminded me a little bit that this is obviously maybe my last match,” said Bjorkman, who noticed preparations for the farewell ceremony during the match.
“You know, I was trying to do everything possible to stay alive one more day, or maybe two.”
Bjorkman won all four doubles Grand Slams as well as the 1998 Davis Cup with Sweden and also reached the 1997 US Open singles semi-final and the last four at Wimbledon just two years ago.
Bjorkman and Ullyett fell to Poland’s Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski as the Swede failed in his bid for a third year-end title.
“I still think it’s great to end my career in the biggest event of the year, even if I would have gone further. But you can’t have everything,” he said.
“I’ve been mentally prepared for this because I’m mentally very ready to retire. I’ve been very fortunate to be able to play for so long.”
Bjorkman, who will now concentrate on editing a Swedish tennis magazine, cited the 1997 US Open loss to Britain’s Greg Rusesdski as his biggest regret.
“Obviously losing to Greg Rusedski in the semi-final was a tough loss because I think that was a chance for me maybe to go all the way,” he said.
Sydney has embarked on a secret initiative to snatch the Australian Open tennis tournament from Melbourne, the Sydney Morning Herald said, citing Events NSW Chief Executive Geoff Parmenter.
The pitch involves a plan to build a multimillion dollar stadium at Glebe Island, west of central Sydney, that could host the Grand Slam event once Melbourne’s contract expires in 2016, the newspaper reported.
Sydney will face competition from overseas cities, with Shanghai, Dubai and Abu Dhabi all preparing campaigns to hold the Asian Grand Slam event, the newspaper said. The Australian Open is worth more than A$100 million ($64 million) to Victoria state’s economy, it said.
