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ITF announces professional tennis restructure

5K views 41 replies 26 participants last post by  Viktorija 
#1 · (Edited)
http://www.itftennis.com/media/256740/256740.pdf

The ITF Board of Directors has approved a major restructuring of professional tennis at its entry level.
The reform programme of changes will include a radical reduction in the number of truly professional
players and the creation of a new global ITF Transition Tour in 2019 that will provide opportunities for
the next generation of talented players to enter the professional pathway.
The reform programme is in response to a three-year ITF Player Pathway review of professional and
junior tennis that included an analysis of player and event data from 2001-13, and a survey of more
than 50,000 stakeholders. The review established that there are too many players trying to compete
on the professional circuit; too few players are breaking even; and the age of these players is
increasing. There are currently around 14,000 players competing in professional tennis events,
almost half of whom do not earn any prize money.
The review also identified that it is taking longer for players to reach the top levels of the sport, and
that many talented junior players experience considerable difficulty in transitioning to professional
tennis.
In order to address these issues, the Board has approved the implementation in 2019 of a new ITF
Transition Tour, featuring a new category of interim tournament at entry-level that will better aid the
transition from junior to professional tennis and ensure a continued opportunity for players from any
nation to join the player pathway. These tournaments will be held within a localised circuit structure
that reduces costs and increases opportunity for players, and reduces staging costs for organisers.
Transition Tour tournaments will be created through the repositioning of the existing $15,000 (Level I)
tournaments on the ITF Pro Circuit that will no longer be held as part of the Pro Circuit in 2019.
Transition Tour tournaments will offer ITF Entry Points instead of ATP/WTA ranking points, with the
two systems linked to ensure that the more successful players are able to use their ITF Entry Points
to gain acceptance into ITF Pro Circuit tournaments.
The ITF’s proposed restructuring will radically reduce the number of professional players competing
for ATP and WTA ranking points. The ITF’s extensive modelling work has led to a recommended
professional player group of no more than 750 men and 750 women players. This new approach will
introduce a clearer and more effective professional pathway and ensure that prize money levels at
ITF Pro Circuit events are better targeted to ensure that more players can make a living from the
professional game.

Players on the ITF Pro Circuit have already benefited from an extensive programme of prize money
increases in 2016 and 2017 following the first part of the Player Pathway review, with total prize
money increasing by around $1.5 million.
The ITF’s proposed Transition Tour will complement this new professional group, ensuring that all
other players, especially the next generation of emerging talent, continue to access local playing
opportunities that can lead to entry into the professional game.
The ITF will now work closely with its member nations, ATP and WTA on the implementation of the
Transition Tour, including confirmation of the technical requirements, tournament schedule and new
ranking point structure.
ITF President David Haggerty said: “The ITF’s Player Pathway study is the most comprehensive
review of professional tennis ever undertaken and has highlighted the considerable challenges at the
base of our game. Over 14,000 players competed at professional level last year which is simply too
many. Radical changes are needed to address the issues of transition between the junior and
professional game, playing affordability, and tournament cost.
“We have already taken an important step forward by increasing prize money levels at ITF Pro Circuit
tournaments. The next step is to ensure the structure of professional tennis is fit for purpose through a
targeted job opportunities approach that will create a smaller group of true professional players. At the
same time it is imperative that we do not reduce the chance for players of any nation or background to
start their journey towards the top 100. We believe that the introduction of a new entry level to the
professional pathway will allow players to take the first steps towards becoming a future champion
within a more targeted and affordable circuit structure. These changes will also ensure that players
and their support team members can understand and measure their progress.”
The ITF Player Pathway review was undertaken to fully understand the tournament structure below
Tour level. The review looked at improving the entry for players into professional tennis; increasing
prize money and the ability for more players to make a living; raising event standards with a focus on
integrity protection; and ensuring developing nations have the opportunity to produce world class
players.
 
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#5 · (Edited)
Among all shit conceived recently by ITF, this seems strangely good and with a sound rationale.

Hope they can implement the idea in the proper way.

The limit of real professionals to no more that 750 per gender is absolutely correct, may be still even too high.

I also understand that "professional" players will not be longer allowed to participate to the Transitional level tournaments, currently 15 000 USD.
 
#6 · (Edited)
I have been wishing this for a while. I have been ridiculed for asking to create a lower level tour and only the highest ranked should enter the WTA each year, while losers in WTA go back to the lower level.
I take full credit for the creation of the this lower division. :) :) :) It's been my idea.

Can't call yourself a Pro player and go back to rack up points at ITF to shore up your ranking.
You are either good enough to play on the Pro tour or you are not.
http://www.tennisgamers.com/board/viewtopic.php?p=103919#103919
 
#15 · (Edited)
I have been wishing this for a while. I have been ridiculed for asking to create a lower level tour and only the highest ranked should enter the WTA each year, while losers in WTA go back to the lower level.
I take full credit for the creation of the this lower division. :) :) :) It's been my idea.

Can't call yourself a Pro player and go back to rack up points at ITF to shore up your ranking.
You are either good enough to play on the Pro tour or you are not.
tennisgamers.com :: View topic - WTA Players to Watch
This will still happen. This only affects the 15 ks

Vultures like Sasai will still drop down to 60K and 75K to build their WTA rankings back up.

And, there will still be players who make the top 100 with little success at the WTA level.

This is just designed to weed out players who do not have the potential to make it past the 15 K level.
 
#8 ·
I am open minded about this, but a few initial thoughts:-

1 - re-naming and re-classifying the current $15k circuit as "non-professional" will do nothing to stop 1000s of players from across the world trying to break onto the pro circuit, and as someone said, a not insignificant number of those 14,000 players only played a handful of local events.

2 - all this will do is turn those currently ranked outside the top 750 from having a WTA ranking to a Transition Tour ranking - so what?

3 - if the idea is to effectively combine the current $15k tournament with local money tournaments into a half-way house domestic circuit, that makes a lot of sense and will increase playing opportunities, but:

(a) there are countries where domestic money tournaments pay more in prize money that $15ks, how will that work?

(b) presumably different countries will run different numbers of tournaments, as per just now - will federations who stump up cash for pro events be willing to do so for non-pro, or will they pool their budget to afford more $25ks and upwards?

(c) if players want to move up to the main ITF tour, they need to get the maximum number of "Transition Tour" event points as possible. This means players will still schedule to play events abroad where they think they have best chance of picking up points, or if their domestic calendar is not great or particularly stacked. For example, if Sharm becomes a weekly "Transition Tour" event, it's still going to attract players from across the world to compete. The only difference is they are competing in an event with a different name for a different set of ranking points. If there is a run of Transition Tour events in West Africa, players will go there hoping for easy points. But, potentially, they will be competing for less money than they are at the moment (as the quid pro quo seemingly will be better prize money in the "true" professional events).

Basically, you will have a tennis circuit that is professional in all but name, with a fairly complex transition mechanism for entry lists into the true ITF events (e.g. how many Transition Tour points put you ahead on the entry list of someone with 1 Pro Tour point). I don't see how telling players they aren't competing in pro events will reduce the number giving it a go, but you actually have the potential to make the financial side of things worse if you are converting the $15ks into something else and reducing the prize money offered - either players rack up huge debts, or you make the Transition Tour only available with those who can fund travel to an even greater extent than is the case with $15ks where you might at least get enough back to cover one night in the hotel. It might increase domestic playing opportunities but again that will lead to huge deviations in standard worldwide, and players competing in weaker nations/regions (or those able to travel to compete in them) will benefit the most, and find it easiest to get the Transition Tour points they need to move up.

So, whilst being open minded, it's not clear to me at all how this will do anything to improve or smoothen the pathway up the ladder. I can't see how it will make things any different in reality to what operates at the moment by putting a fairly artificial line between events above $15k level. It seems to me to be a rebranding exercise and removing money from the bottom rung of pro tennis to put it more into the mid-way (not necessarily a bad thing at all in my view), but I can't see that it is transformational in any way.


It's a fairly sneaky way of dealing with the perceived issue of having "too many professionals" - just re-classify half of them as amateurs and you're done!


One positive side effect would be the removal of "playing down" if "professionals" aren't allowed to compete in transitional events (maybe unless they've been out for 3 months plus or something?). You wouldn't have a scenario which happens from time to time where top 250 players step down to play some $15ks.

But that's just a first glance. It's all going to hinge on implementation and the details so I will not be totally down on the plans until we see how it might work in practice. Certainly very interesting, and I can see the logic underpinning them, so will be cautiously optimistic that it will be a good move!
 
#9 ·
I am open minded about this, but a few initial thoughts:-

1 - re-naming and re-classifying the current $15k circuit as "non-professional" will do nothing to stop 1000s of players from across the world trying to break onto the pro circuit, and as someone said, a not insignificant number of those 14,000 players only played a handful of local events.

2 - all this will do is turn those currently ranked outside the top 750 from having a WTA ranking to a Transition Tour ranking - so what?

3 - if the idea is to effectively combine the current $15k tournament with local money tournaments into a half-way house domestic circuit, that makes a lot of sense and will increase playing opportunities, but:

(a) there are countries where domestic money tournaments pay more in prize money that $15ks, how will that work?

(b) presumably different countries will run different numbers of tournaments, as per just now - will federations who stump up cash for pro events be willing to do so for non-pro, or will they pool their budget to afford more $25ks and upwards?

(c) if players want to move up to the main ITF tour, they need to get the maximum number of "Transition Tour" event points as possible. This means players will still schedule to play events abroad where they think they have best chance of picking up points, or if their domestic calendar is not great or particularly stacked. For example, if Sharm becomes a weekly "Transition Tour" event, it's still going to attract players from across the world to compete. The only difference is they are competing in an event with a different name for a different set of ranking points. If there is a run of Transition Tour events in West Africa, players will go there hoping for easy points. But, potentially, they will be competing for less money than they are at the moment (as the quid pro quo seemingly will be better prize money in the "true" professional events).

Basically, you will have a tennis circuit that is professional in all but name, with a fairly complex transition mechanism for entry lists into the true ITF events (e.g. how many Transition Tour points put you ahead on the entry list of someone with 1 Pro Tour point). I don't see how telling players they aren't competing in pro events will reduce the number giving it a go, but you actually have the potential to make the financial side of things worse if you are converting the $15ks into something else and reducing the prize money offered - either players rack up huge debts, or you make the Transition Tour only available with those who can fund travel to an even greater extent than is the case with $15ks where you might at least get enough back to cover one night in the hotel. It might increase domestic playing opportunities but again that will lead to huge deviations in standard worldwide, and players competing in weaker nations/regions (or those able to travel to compete in them) will benefit the most, and find it easiest to get the Transition Tour points they need to move up.

So, whilst being open minded, it's not clear to me at all how this will do anything to improve or smoothen the pathway up the ladder. I can't see how it will make things any different in reality to what operates at the moment by putting a fairly artificial line between events above $15k level. It seems to me to be a rebranding exercise and removing money from the bottom rung of pro tennis to put it more into the mid-way (not necessarily a bad thing at all in my view), but I can't see that it is transformational in any way.


It's a fairly sneaky way of dealing with the perceived issue of having "too many professionals" - just re-classify half of them as amateurs and you're done!


One positive side effect would be the removal of "playing down" if "professionals" aren't allowed to compete in transitional events (maybe unless they've been out for 3 months plus or something?). You wouldn't have a scenario which happens from time to time where top 250 players step down to play some $15ks.

But that's just a first glance. It's all going to hinge on implementation and the details so I will not be totally down on the plans until we see how it might work in practice. Certainly very interesting, and I can see the logic underpinning them, so will be cautiously optimistic that it will be a good move!
Have to say, that summed up my main reactions to these changes as well. :yeah:
 
#10 ·
...

The review established that:

• In 2013 there were 8874 male professional players [3896 of whom earned no prize money].
In 2013 there were 4862 female professional players [2212 of whom earned no prize money].

• In 2013 average costs for playing professional tennis [includes flights, accommodation, food, restringing, laundry, clothing, equipment and airport transfers but not including coaching costs] were $38,800 for male players and $40,180 for female players [this obviously changes depending on region and/or ranking].

• In 2013 total men’s prize money was approximately $162m. An even distribution would provide every male player that earned prize money with $32,638. In that year the top 1% of male players (top 50) won 60% ($97,448,106), which reduced the even distribution average down to $13,195.

• In 2013 total women’s prize money was approximately $120m. An even distribution would provide every female player that earned prize money with $45,205. In that year the top 1% of female players [top 26] won 51% ($60,585,592) of total prize money, which reduced the even distribution average down to $22,564.

• The break even point on the earnings list (i.e. the point where average costs met actual earnings) was 336 for men and 253 for women in 2013.

• In nominal terms total prize money in the men’s and women’s game has risen since 2001. This is due in the main to a significant increase in the number of competitive opportunities (tournaments) around the world and introduction of certain new tournament categories (W-$15k, $100k and $125k, M-$35k).

• This increase has been countered (in terms of earnings per player) by an increase in the number of players competing for the total prize money pool.

• While numbers of players entering the professional game has risen since 2001, the numbers moving from juniors to top 100 has remained constant.

• The time taken from earning the first ranking point to entering the top 100 from 2000 to 2013 is slowly increasing [3.7 years to 4.8 years for men / 3.4 years to 4.1 years for women].

• The number of nations hosting professional tennis events has not changed significantly since 2001.

• There are significantly more professional events for players to compete in, but that growth of events is being driven by Europe.
 
#11 ·
well I think this is the end of the "I"-TF - the tour will be less international and this system favours Europe, the US and maybe Australia.

I dont think it is a good idea - it would have been better imo to restructure the point systems and the price money distribution
 
#14 ·
well I think this is the end of the "I"-TF - the tour will be less international and this system favours Europe, the US and maybe Australia.
The intent is surely the opposite. I'm not at all clear how it's supposed to work, mind you--maybe I should give the document a more thorough read.

I'm pretty sure the current situation isn't healthy. If you go back in time beyond half a generation, you have true professional tennis players from Madagascar and more than one from Indonesia. (Maybe Jabeur is the closest to a modern day equivalent, but are there any others?)

I'd like to correlate a country's number of players in the top 200 with average income to try to crystallise my feeling that it's more than ever a rich country's game, but unfortunately I'm far too lazy.
 
#13 ·
I haven't done any analysis of it but off the top of my head having only 750 pros in an international sport seems strange.
 
#19 ·
Only thing it's gonna do is make the job easier for people who do the rankings
 
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#20 ·
If you look at the South African rankings, this is a great example.. the lowest ranked player (ranked 3rd) won half her matches played of 6, but never left the country. Such a waste of talent and potential at around 21 years old. Chances are she will never persue being a professional because it is just too expensive, and there are not enough local tournaments. Same with the 2nd ranked player, who only played 2 tournaments outside of South Africa - probably got a rare sponsorship to USA for a couple of weeks. Travel is so expensive especially with the weak currency. Screenshot attached.

It is already tough, and this will just make it tougher when the tournaments outside the Pro circuit pays less, or when it becomes more difficult to play in a higher tournament that pays better.
 

Attachments

#23 ·
Exactly, or that try to make a comeback after injury or retirement. How long would Sevastova or Barty have taken to get back. And imagine a player like Svonereva who is giving it another go.. And these were top players and are Top talents.. imagine how tough it would be for someone lower down the order..
 
#26 ·
Wonder what this would mean for tournaments that struggle to get enough high-ranked players to attend. Just as an example, this week's 60k in Quanzhou had the majority of their qualifiers ranked under 750, so not 'real' pros according to the 2019 and onwards definition. Would they need to hold this with fewer qualifiers in that case or would the lower-ranked players still be allowed to enter based on their transition points? I understand the new rules are meant to prevent that from happening, but I somehow doubt it would lead to full entry lists no matter where and when tourneys are held.

http://www.itftennis.com/procircuit/tournaments/women's-tournament/info.aspx?tournamentid=1100039836
 
#31 ·
That's a very interesting point! Here you have a Chinese tournament who has sponsors willing to pay money to the players, and $60,000 would put this tournament on the pro circuit, but with no pro tennis players entering (ranked above 750). So it seems like they cannot allow the two levels to mix, so will it mean this tournament has to be downgraded with less money awarded to players, and how can the ITF be happy with their players then being paid less? Or will it mean tournament cancellations where insufficient numbers of 'pros' enter? That would be even worse.

Or will they allow such a tournament to pay 'non-pros' more money than many pro tournaments.. which for me would be the best solution, but it still would not solve the problem of knowing where to pitch a tournament in the first place, and knowing whether to invite the pros or non-pros to enter. Inviting the pros could lead to no or few entries and cancellation.

Or mixing pros and non-pros at one tournament.. How will it come across for non-pros to be playing pros? And would there be a difference in ranking points and prize money? All very confusing..
 
#28 ·
it definitely favours younger players - "the next generation" as the ITF calls them (sounds much like the WTA press releases).

Honestly, thumbs down for this, it will be hard for experienced players, comeback players and players "who just love the sports" to compete internationally anymore. We will have a tour full of crying kids.
 
#32 ·
miss the Feed Up's that various ITF events gave. Thats another reason why players blossom late
Bonus points also helped the youngsters in moving up ranks quickly
 
#36 ·
The ITF wants to reduce the number of total players but wants more players to make a living from tennis? OK

Increase the number of bigger ITFs. Last season there were 166 ATP Challenger tournaments but only 73 tournaments ranging from $50K to $125K prize money on the women's side. 48 of those were 50Ks. The ITF schedule until mid-April is a total mess with only one single 100K. Why is there no big ITF in Australia during the season's first week and during the second week of the AO? There should be a big ITF in the second week of all GS, IW and Miami. South America could do way better from February to April.

Rework tournament categories and points distribution. Since this season we have 15K, 25K, 60K, 80K,100K and WTA 125K. Better would be 15K, 25K, 40K, 60K, 100K and WTA 160K.
Why do 25Ks offer more than 4 times as many points as 15Ks? This doesn't make any sense.
Something like this:



At the end of the day it's about finding more tournaments which can pay the players and organize these tournaments into regional swings to reduce travel costs for the players.
 
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