March 1, 2007: The day that sent round robin system to history
Some 130 years after the first "modern" tennis tournaments, the ATP had tried to implement some fundamental changes to what has been a simple elimination system that had been working for over a century. Namely, instead of a knock-out system that sends you out from the tournament as soon as you suffer a defeat (outside the ATP Finals, of course), the ATP officials had wanted to impose the round robin system to some 13 lower-ranked ATP tournaments in 2007, with Adelaide serving as the testing ground. It was everything but simple, with 16 players competing in the first round (four qualifiers, three players with the wild card and nine based on the ATP ranking) to reach the round robin system and join 16 other players who were already there.
Once it was completed, eight groups with three players were formed and they competed against each other to determine the winners of the group and the quarter-final field! The top seed Novak Djokovic wrote history as the first player who won the ATP title in this new format, beating Jan Hajek and Alun Jones in Group 1 before ousting Paul Goldstein and Joachim Johansson in the quarters and semis to reach the final against the wild card Chris Guccione. The Serb won the challenging final 6-3, 6-7, 6-4 to lift the title and the players had a chance to compete in the round robin system again at Delray Beach in February.
This time the winner was Xavier Malisse despite the fact he lost in the group phase to Rainer Schuettler (he had to win only one set to advance into the quarters), producing the unseen precedent in the history of men's tennis outside the already mentioned ATP Finals! Vina del Mar and Buenos Aires followed the same pattern and the fifth event with this formula was played at the Tennis Channel Open in Las Vegas in March, exposing all the flaws of this system in comparison to a good old method of elimination! Group 1 gathered the defending champion James Blake, Juan Martin del Potro and Evgeny Korolev, and they all finished with one win and two sets won and lost.
The main problem occurred when Juan Martin del Potro retired against James Blake due to respiratory problems while trailing 1-6, 1-3. The Argentinian was ruled out since this match went into his losing record but not to the matches he completed and the organizers were to decide who would reach the quarters, Korolev or Blake. Instead of searching for the number of games won (James was on 15-14 and Evgeny on 17-18) the organizers played on the head-to-head card and announced that the Russian had reached the quarters. In another twist in the tale, the ATP Chairman and President Etienne de Villiers had to be involved and he made the following statement:
"James Blake was awarded the group on the basis that the rules were not sufficiently explained. James was within just a few games of winning this match comfortably to advance. Juan Martin has stated that he would have completed the match had he been fully aware of the implications of his retirement."
Korolev was sent home with an $11,000-plus consolation prize and this all happened just three hours before the quarter-final matches were scheduled to start, creating a chaotic and unpleasant situation for both the organizers and the players themselves. The round robin system was on thin ice and the organizers of the famous grass events at Queen's and Newport said they would think twice before actually using it, although they didn't have to think about that since the ATP abandoned it on March 21! As most of the players were hoping for, Las Vegas had served as the last ATP tournament that implemented the round robin format and the ATP went back to a standard and simple elimination system that keeps the things plain and simple.
from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/2En2SBq
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