Good News for Women’s Tennis: withdrawals dropped by more than one third
Good News for Women’s Tennis: withdrawals dropped by more than one third
Good News for Women’s Tennis: withdrawals dropped by more than one third
The WTA Sony Ericsson Women’s Tennis Tour ended the 2009 season with a good news… The players withdrawals from mandatory tennis tournaments dropped 34% thanks to the WTA Tour’s new scheduling system.
The tour has also made it past the global financial crisis saying the attendance went up 11 percent at the premier tournaments in 2009 and prize money increased by 34 percent.
The women’s tennis tour lowered the number of mandatory tournaments from 13 to 10 and extended its offseason by two weeks to help the top players to prevent injuries
“If we don’t have healthy athletes, we can’t have a level of product that we want,” Allaster said. “That’s why it was important in the roadmap that we scheduled breaks. That is why there is a long break after Wimbledon, so they can take a rest after that grind.”
The longer offseason is also meant to give players more time to recover.
“We have two more weeks for them,” Allaster said. “They have two good months that they can have a good break.”
Even this are good news still some top players are playing too much and at the end of the 2009 season suffered the consequences.
During the Sony Ericsson Championships last week (the last WTA tournament of the year) Dinara Safina withdrew with a serious back injury, and Caroline Wozniacki had to quit in her semifinal against Serena Williams.
Victoria Azarenka retired in the third set, and alternate Vera Zvonareva pulled out after playing one match.
“Caroline Wozniacki played over 90 matches this year. That’s a lot of play,” Allaster said. “She, I’m sure, will be relooking at her schedule and the level of play that she can have.”
About their shorter schedule Svetlana Kuznetsova said: “Comparing to the men’s tour, our schedule is much better. They still have two or three more weeks to go. It’s crazy because you don’t get time to rest and don’t get time to have good preparation before next season. For us, it’s so much different, so much better.”
Source AP/Yahoo
