Tennis: The staggered ATP calendar, soon the norm?

This week marks the start of the Asian tour on the two circuits with the tournaments in Chengdu and Zhuhai for example for the men. The highlight will obviously be the return of the Shanghai Masters 1000 to the calendar this year, contested for the first time since Daniil Medvedev’s victory in 2019. But this tournament is being contested under the new format over ten days and with a much more dense. Obviously, it therefore takes up more space in the calendar and several tournaments have been slightly postponed in time.

As Madrid et Romewhich are passed on the model ofIndian Wells et Miami in 2023, Shanghai will therefore be contested under the same conditions from October 4. Both Summer Masters 1000 on hard will follow suit from 2025 and for the moment, Montecarlo et Paris-Bercy will remain in their current format. With more weeks devoted to these big events, some tournaments will disappear and some are already adapting by slightly shifting their schedule to end with the final on Tuesday or Wednesday.

Offbeat tournaments

This week, the tournaments Zhuhai and of Chengdu started on Wednesday for the big picture and will end next Tuesday. The choice is perhaps surprising even if theATP perhaps wanted to shift the program slightly to allow the players who were playing in the Davis Cup last week to make the trip. The trend will continue the following week with the tournamentsAstana and of Beijing which will also have their final on Tuesday and Wednesday just before the start of the Masters 1000 in Shanghai.

Tennis: There is fire in the Tsitsipas house! https://t.co/U0nGcYBLCq pic.twitter.com/eNoCVULFiz

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Soon the norm?

If this is not the case at the moment before Indian Wells or before Madridthis small gap in time before a Masters 1000 over ten days could spread elsewhere. But the choice of having the final of these tournaments played on Tuesday or Wednesday remains very surprising since a final during the week risks seeing fairly empty stands.

Light beginnings

This year is the first time since 2019 that the players have returned to China for the real Asian tour. With the absences of many players from the top 100, others are lucky enough to be able to participate in tournaments ATP even though they are not necessarily used to it. This is the case for example for the French Terence Atmanewho has won a lot on the circuit Challenger recently and who was able to play his first match on the circuit ATP.