Mahesh Bhupathi owned Globosport is set to launch the International Tennis Premier league from next year. The tournament, which is inspired by the IPl, will involve several cities across Asia and could have a big impact on the tennis world. Ajeyo Basu explores
The IPl bug is really catching on in Indian sports. Hockey, wrestling, badminton and kabaddi have already started their own leagues inspired by the highly popular Twenty20 cricket tournament and now tennis too is set to jump on to the bandwagon.
By initial accounts at least, the International Premier Tennis league (IPTl), to be floated by Globosport, a company owned by doubles legend Mahesh Bhupathi, has the potential to be a roaring success.
The event will be held across at least 9-10 cities across Asia, with Delhi, Kolkata, Singapore, Tokyo, Mumbai, Hong Kong, Manila, Seoul, Dubai, Jakarta and Doha in contention to buy six franchisees.
The IPTl has the backing of a galaxy of top stars with the likes of world number one Novak Djokovic, reigning French Open champion Rafael Nadal, current Olympic champion Andy Murray, Serena Williams, and legends Andre Aggasi and Pete Sampras promising to feature in the league, which is expected to begin in December 2014, prior to the Australian Open.
The league will have a 30-match schedule in its first year with home-and-away matches between each of the six franchises. Each team can have six to 10 players. There will be five matches a night in one-set men’s singles, women’s singles, men’s doubles, mixed doubles and legends singles.
Bhupathi himself is quite excited about the league and feels that it will be a hit with television audiences across the continent. “We wanted a model which was TV friendly, spectator friendly and of course player friendly. The biggest complaint in tennis has been that you have no control over time of a match. You don’t know if Grand Slam final will be a two-hour match or a five-hour match. Here we are guaranteeing TV that it will be over in maximum of three hours, so all are excited,” Bhupathi was quoted as saying by PTI.
Bhupathi said the cities in contention to host the franchises for the high profile tennis league will have to fulfill a host of criteria in order to ensure that their bids are successful. “There is a couple of important criteria, the first is that they have to have an international airport, security, stadium size, so we have a mandate,” Bhupathi said. “At the end of the day, we would like to spread it, ideally in the first year, I don’t want to have two teams in India, even if there is demand because of the IPl success. As we grow, we plan to start with six and grow over time.”
While such an endeavor is indeed praiseworthy since it will raise the profile of the game and attract a sizeable television audience in India and across the entire region, the real question is how much of an impact it will have on Indian tennis.
At first glance, the benefits for the game in the country and for young, upcoming Indian players are immense. They will get an invaluable opportunity to play with and against some of the biggest names in world tennis. It should lead to an improvement in their skill levels and confidence to take on top quality opposition.
With the increasing development in the Indian economy, we are witnessing a gradual Americanisation of Indian sports. More and more sports are opting for the franchisee based leagues popular in the United States. With the government proving both unwilling and unable to provide the much needed boost to Indian sports, perhaps the only hope rests with the private sector and leagues like the IPl which are modeled on the NBA and Major league Baseball.
A financially lucrative tournament like this would also help to nurture the future generation of tennis stars if the IPTl can manage to accommodate upcoming young players in their set-up.
Bhupathi’s doubles partner Rohan Bopanna is excited about the IPTl and cannot wait for it to start. “I think it will have a huge effect on Indian tennis especially because all the young talent and tennis lovers come together with the best in the world to compete in a city close to you. Whether you watch it live or on TV, I am sure the league is going to popularize the sport and in the process, will also attract corporate sponsors to come out in support of Indian tennis,” Bopanna told The Pioneer. “Expectations are high from the IPTl, especially since we have a team with all the top players and also the fact that it’s going to be held Asia, where we hardly have many tournaments. A combination of all of this makes the IPTl a much anticipated event. Our sport needs ideas like this to help in the development of the game.”
Talking about the effect of the IPTl on young tennis players, Bopanna said,” If they get drafted it is definitely going to help the players financially which is a great support since we generally get no sponsors to help us out.”
Although the tennis calendar is already crowded and critics have pointed out that one more tournament will only add to the burden of the players, Bopanna brushed such concerns aside. “Yes the tennis calendar is crowded for sure, but as per ATP it is upto the players to decide and choose what tournaments they want to play in , Since the players themselves decide how to go about things, I don’t see the crowded tennis calendar as a problem at all,” he said. “Since the ATP calendar has us travelling all over the world, we end up playing across various continents all through the year. So travelling around Asia is hardly a concern. Also travelling with a team is always fun and good camaraderie.”
Purav Raja, who made his Davis Cup debut in February, felt IPTl will have an effect on tennis similar to that of T20s on cricket. “I think it will be something like T20 cricket. We all like T20, we all watch the IPl, don’t weIJ” he said.