In the leadup to the WTA’s season finale annually, the competing gamers usually hope to spend their days making remaining preparations on the stadium court docket. There are, in any case, numerous particulars to fine-tune, from adapting to the pace of the court docket floor, to the wind and solar.
Not this time. As the eight greatest tennis gamers in the world arrived in Cancún final week for the WTA Finals, the stadium was nonetheless a messy constructing web site and the arduous court docket floor had but to be laid. The venue is a short lived construction erected at brief discover on the grounds of a luxurious lodge resort and, to the displeasure of the gamers, it was not prepared till the day earlier than play started on Saturday morning.
“I’m not very happy that this is the first day we hit on the stadium,” stated Ons Jabeur. “This is such a big event. We should have been able to be ready and hit on the court. Hopefully this will never, ever, ever happen again. Like, ever …”
What could also be a small drawback in isolation is one of numerous points this season which have left some gamers disenchanted with their governing physique and its amateurish failings. It additionally presents critical questions on the administration of the WTA because it approaches a tipping level in its historical past.
The 2023 WTA Finals have been by no means alleged to be held in Mexico. In 2018, the tour sealed a 10-year contract stated to be value almost $1bn for the WTA Finals to be held in Shenzhen between 2019 and 2028. At that point, the WTA was aggressively increasing into China, a method that has had dire penalties for the organisation.
Four months after the controversial first and solely version in Shenzhen, Covid-19 struck. Since its cancellation in 2020, the WTA Finals has flitted from metropolis to metropolis and not using a house. After Guadalajara 2021, final yr Dallas-Fort Worth was selected solely in September. With solely two months to advertise the occasion, the crowds have been predictably pitiful.
History repeated itself this yr as the tour once more did not finalise the location till the final minute. After a extremely publicised board vote throughout the US Open, the tour introduced Cancún as the profitable bid on 7 September, rejecting profitable gives from Saudi Arabia and the Czech Republic.
After studying of his defeat, Tomas Petera, the organiser of the Czech bid, slammed the WTA. He argued that the Czechs had supplied a far better deal: a 4‑yr dedication with $15m prize cash and a $6m charge to the WTA in a market that would offer each the status of full crowds and profitable earnings. Instead, the WTA will tackle a heavy monetary burden in Cancún and gamers will obtain $9m prize cash. It is extensively believed that Cancún will act as a stopgap till subsequent yr, and Saudi Arabia could also be on the playing cards once more.
The turbulence of the WTA Finals since the pandemic started displays the tour’s difficulties. The occasion is the tour’s greatest monetary asset and it has traditionally supplied important income. After the WTA made a loss of solely $1m in 2019, in response to its public accounts, it has had losses of $16.5m in 2020 and $15.1m in 2021.
With such troublesome funds, the WTA has did not sufficiently promote the sport. Its streaming platform, WTA TV, persistently has technical points and, six years after its launch, nonetheless doesn’t have a cell app. While the ATP’s considerably larger group floods followers with diverse off-court and on-court social medal content material, following the lead of Formula One, the WTA’s YouTube account produces brief highlights and little else. The WTA has not posted on TikTok in three years. Over the previous decade, the prize cash hole between the ATP and WTA has widened considerably.
With its again to the wall, the WTA introduced this yr that CVC Capital Partners would make a $150m funding in the tour, with the personal fairness agency receiving a 20% stake in return. From subsequent yr the tour construction will change dramatically and a brand new industrial arm of the tour, WTA Ventures, can be born.
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For the players, scheduling rules will change, with top players heavily restricted from playing smaller WTA 250 events so that they will compete in the bigger events more frequently, increasing the likelihood of establishing memorable rivalries. The WTA has also said there will be greater investment in marketing and the tour will follow a path to equal prize money with the ATP over the next decade. Given its recent organisational issues, it remains to be seen how faithfully WTA will live up to these grand pronouncements.
Despite these off-court problems, this has been a strong year on the court and the cast for the season finale is impressive. Iga Swiatek has followed up her all-time great 2022 season with an excellent, consistent year and Aryna Sabalenka, the No 1, has proven herself a worthy rival. The year-end No 1 ranking will be decided between them in Mexico.
After years of suffocating hype, Coco Gauff came of age in incredible scenes at the US Open, winning her first grand slam title. She joins Swiatek’s round‑robin group alongside Jabeur and Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova, with Jabeur and Vondrousova adding greater dimension to the tour with their varied playing styles.
Sabalenka’s group, meanwhile, includes Elena Rybakina, who has backed up her 2022 Wimbledon title with a stellar season, and perennial top‑10 players Jessica Pegula and Maria Sakkari. The players will battle hard on the court, of that there is no doubt, but the onus is on the WTA to build a structure around them that is worthy of their talents.
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