Pavlyuchenkova: 'Roger Federer, Nadal and Djokovic do something, while...'

Jurgen Melzer is one of the members of the Player Council, as well as being one of the most respected veterans on the tour. The Austrian recently took part in the 'Tennis Legends' vodcast together with Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, where he analyzed the possibility of bringing the tennis circuit together under a single theme. This idea had been put forward some time ago by Roger Federer, who had found the support of numerous illustrious colleagues but also some detractors (such as Nick Kyrgios). The former World number 8, semi-finalist at Roland Garros in 2010, seems to be in favor of a proposal that - if implemented - could help the growth of professional tennis.

Melzer and Pavlyuchenkova on ATP-WTA merger

"I have been asked this a few times these last few weeks," Jurgen Melzer said on the Tennis Legends vodcast. "I would say in a perfect world, of course you want to unite tennis and you want to have it under one big leadership, I think it would be perfect. "If we have the chance of being a global association, all of a sudden we can fight against soccer and all the other big sports in the world. Because right now, what we have, we have the ITF on one side, then we have the ATP, we have the WTA. You know, you work for TV. If all the TV rights would be under one big umbrella, how much more power would you have? That is just one thing. At least, that’s my common sense. I don’t know if it’s like that in reality. They have to negotiate with so many different things, it would be much easier if they could be under one umbrella. But that’s the perfect world. DO we live in a perfect world? No!" - he added. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova also shared her views on the subject: "I feel like the guys, they’ve always been more united. I always hear or see in the news that Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer or Novak Djokovic have come up with some comments or they do something, like they comment about ATP. But I never anything from our top players from the WTA. They’re always silent. I would love to see more. Not only to see a united ATP and WTA, but at least just within WTA I would like our top players like Serena Williams, for example, to comment and come up, get a voice. Step up, because I don’t think somebody who is ranked top 50 in the world can make a huge change. I don’t believe in that."

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/3ielRBj