Basel to try again renaming central court after Roger Federer
Last year the Swiss Indoors in Basel tried to rename the St. Jakobs Hall, the Central Court that hosts the event, as a "Roger Federer Arena". But due to politics issues, that was not possible, which was not definitely good news for organizers and fans as just on that year that court got rebuilt featuring 10,000 seats in total. Naming it after Federer would have been the icing on the cake. Federer was born in Basel and he has a deal to play the Swiss event until this year included. He won nine titles there, including the most recent one against Marius Copil in the last year's final.
For Switzerland, tradition is very important. They usually name places, streets only after that the famous person died. Now a local committee wants to introduce an initiative under the banner "Roger-Federer-Arena now!" in Basel. In the next days, they will collect some firms by the people who are allowed to vote and they have to raise 3,000 votes. A change could be seen only at the end of 2020 when Federer will be a 39-year-old and may have ended his career. In many other tennis tournaments like Australian Open and Barcelona, there are no issues for it: the first calendar Grand Slam of the year has its own Rod Laver Arena, while the Spanish event' Central Court is named after Rafael Nadal.
Story by Berner Zeitung.
from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/2HQ2DlG
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