ATP Co-Founder Bob Green: PTPA should aim higher
Recently it has become quiet about the newly founded PTPA. Now, Bob Green, a former vice-president of the ATP Tour, has spoken out - and confirms the PTPA's intentions that they once had when the ATP Tour was founded.
by Florian Goosmann
last edit:
Nov 20, 2021, 03:39 pm
The PTPA (Professional Tennis Players Association) should strive for even higher goals than they have been doing so far, namely a player majority or a majority on the board of the ATP Tour itself. And the players should take the lead in men's tennis, said Bob Green in an article in the Sports Business Journal . Green is a former top 40 player and was vice president of the ATP tour from 1988 to 1995.
When the ATP was founded, the current 50/50 structure in partnership with the tournaments that are currently in place was not in mind, the players should have made up the majority at that time. In view of the threatened bankruptcy of the ATP in 1989, a 50/50 solution was agreed under pressure from the tournament directors in order to secure the guarantees and television rights required. "I've always believed that this compromise was the Achilles' heel of the tour, and we see now that it will be completely exposed with the creation of the PTPA, whose members feel underrepresented in the current system," Green writes.
Green sees the PGA Tour as a role model
Green cites the PGA (golf) tour as a positive example of what a player-led organization can achieve. "Players can and should be in control of the sponsorship and television revenue they generate and how that revenue is distributed." The PTPA is currently selling below value if it sees itself mainly as a union that negotiates with the owners. The players are not workers. "You are the product, as such you should be in control."
The PTPA was founded in 2020 by Novak Djokovic and Vasek Pospisil, and the aim was not to replace the ATP, but to give the players better representation, to ensure transparency and fairness. A problem with the ATP tour: Here players and tournaments are on an equal footing, many players fear that they will not be sufficiently involved in the income. Most recently it was said that 80 percent of the players were already on board - with Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, however, two big names that have always been critical of the PTPA are missing.
Recently, however, the PTPA had become quiet and a specific program has not yet been established. Novak Djokovic also admitted that the PTPA is not yet where it should be.
PTPA needs Federer and Nadal
Green goes on to explain that as early as 1988 it became clear that wherever a united group of players went, tournaments would follow. "The way to a restructured tour board is not far for the PTPA." However, almost all of the top 10 players were there at the time. Therefore, Federer and Nadal would also have to be involved in order to form a large front.
Green sees it as a waste of money to create your own PTPA structure, with a restructuring of the ATP you would have the staff, after all, it depends more on the influence of the PTPA. As soon as the restructuring was completed, the PTPA could then dissolve, the work could then be done by the ATP with the help of a stronger players' council.
The current problem: "The reactions of the ATP Tour and some players towards the PTPA reveals the self-interest and self-preservation that have always held back the sport," said Green.