The Ultimate Tennis Showdown is back
During the Corona break in 2020, Patrick Mouratoglou developed an innovative match and tournament format in his academy: the Ultimate Tennis Showdown. This series will be resumed in 2023.
by tennisnet.com
last edit: Dec 01, 2022, 11:22 pm
Maybe it was because Dominic Thiem announced his appearance at one of the events of Patrick Mouratoglou's Ultimate Tennis Showdown (UTS) series quite late: There is nothing more than "Domi" in terms of nicknames or battle names enough. The organizers have already put more effort into other players: Matteo Berrettini started as "The Hammer" (somehow understandable), Daniil Medvedev as "The Chessmaster" (very understandable), Stefanos Tsitsipas as "The Greek God" (now , yes) or Alexander Zverev as "The Lion" (oh, yes).
It is still unclear which of these stars will also be at the start of the fun events with an innovative character in the coming year. However, the dates are fixed. And for the first time, Mouratoglou will also be serving outside the academy: from July 20th to 23rd in the USA (that fits quite well before the start of the hard court season); from September 14th to 17th in Europe (doesn't that conflict with the Davis Cup?); and finally at the end of November with the third preliminary tournament and the grand final somewhere in Asia.
#IMG2#
Everything has to get faster
The goal of the UTS is probably best defined with "entertainment" and "innovation". The matches should be kept short (four quarters of eight minutes each), there is only one serve, the time between the points is only 15 seconds, in the event of a 2-2 tie, a sudden death tiebreak decides.
On-court coaching is allowed, and interviews can also be conducted with players during matches. And the players are given a longer leash when it comes to how they behave on the court. Let's see who can get enthusiastic about it in the coming year.