Welcome back! In today’s edition, I’m bringing you exclusive chats with Felix Auger-Aliassime (loves the chase for the Finals, hates the balls used in Paris) and Learner Tien (praises Michael Chang’s help, loved all the growth he got this year from wins but also losses). You’ll also read some musings about - what else in 2025? - the calendar's never-ending-to-be-messy situation.
If you’re wondering how the press seats are going in the new Parisian arena, here’s the answer: Not Well. It will surely be fixed next year, but in the meantime, I need to find some binoculars! As our British friends would say: “This is not ideal…” Another not ideal situation: having to tiptoe around that place to avoid falling because, for some reason, carpet was set up on cables, holes, whatever else you can imagine. It’s been a hazard. Positive sides: the smaller courts are so - so! - much better for everybody involved than at Bercy, and crowds were already in at 11 am, enjoying courts 1 and 2. Everything is close by for players and media, which is huge. Do I miss the Bercy vibe? Yes. Do I think La Défense could grow on me? Also, yes.
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ATP’s Calendar Strategy: Reading Between The Lines
Some things just do not make sense to me. And it’s bugging my tennis brain. So, stream of consciousness on the way.
The cat is finally out of the bag: Saudi Arabia will have an ATP Masters 1000. A one-week one (Praise The Tennis Universe!). And it should be a non-mandatory, like Monte-Carlo. Now, the crux of the matter: When? Well, good question! It hasn’t been revealed, but it seems it should be in the first part of the year, and if you look at the current schedule, the thing that sounds logical would be to see it in February with Doha and Dubai. Anything earlier, and the Australian Open will be on the warpath —it is well known. But also let’s be real here: There Is No More Space for A New 1000 Event In That Damn Schedule. There is no more space for a bonus event in that damn schedule!
Side note, an agent of a rather prominent player told me about the ATP as we were talking about the state of the calendar: “They’re protecting four or five guys and just don’t give a fuck about the rest of them. They see all the other guys as interchangeable.” Is the trust in the powers that be at an all-time low? I’d say yep, kinda!
So, if you bring a 1000 in, then, I’m sorry, we all know other events will have to get out. There is just no other way. And that’s when I read that interview of the Canadian 1000 director on Bounces and so discovered that there was a buyback programme that would basically pay for some events (250s and 500s) to disappear. To take away “some of the tournaments that clutter the calendar.” And so my brain stopped there. I was like, wait. Wut? Hmmm… Hmmmm… Wut? Like, I get it. I understand the principle. I also understand how much money the sport is getting (and hopes to get) from Saudi Arabia. I also get that Canada’s ATP 1000 got pretty much screwed by the stars this year and needs to be guaranteed the respect of its premium status (that it paid a lot of money to get and keep, like all the other 1000s). I get it, okay.
But then one has to say the reality out loud: If you take a good number of 250s and 500s out of the season’s calendar, you’re then taking away a good number of jobs. Half of the players on the tour make their living thanks to the 250s and 500s. So who’s going to tell them all they’re soon to be unemployed? And, hum, maybe make sure Sinner and Alcaraz still have players to beat in these first rounds?
Also, in this whole “let’s be golf, let’s be the NBA!” mania that is all around tennis right now, can someone also please tell me how young players are now supposed to climb up the rankings if we take out a chunk of the events they could use to build their game, earn their points, start to make some money? It’s time to tell people the truth. If the ATP keeps going for what has all the looks of a Premium Tour, then the belly of the rankings is about to get unemployed.
Is it a coincidence that, at the same time, the ATP keeps pushing for an Elite Tour, it announces “a record $32.4 million in ATP Challenger Tour prize money for the 2026 season, featuring an additional $5 million in singles compensation compared to 2025”? and that they expand the calendar from 216 to 265 events? It could be. Or it could mean they’re building a much wider-than-ever-before secondary tour, where the belly of the ranking is now going to get stuck.
“I am not saying which way is better or not; I’m just here asking for a bit of honesty.”
I am not saying which way is better or not; I’m just here asking for a bit of honesty. You cannot go around saying you want to give even more work to players and, at the same time, set up a buyback to slash a good chunk of events. Same, you cannot tell the players you want to lighten their schedule while you keep expanding and adding big events, and while you do nothing against the exhibitions that are coming to clutter that schedule too. I’m sorry, but the 250s and the 500s being told they’re cluttering the calendar and not the exhibitions is kind of hilarious to me. Like. I mean… They are the only ones giving points and opportunities to most of the field, while these exhibitions are for the 1% so… Maybe they’re the ones growing the sport at the base, while the rest is just PR, show without stakes and money bags?
“It’s not to make excuses, but frankly, the balls are bad.”
Felix Auger-Aliassime found a way to win his first match in Paris on Tuesday despite a tricky opponent (beat Francisco Comesana 6-7(2), 6-3, 6-3), a dodgy knee, and these Head Tour XT balls that he absolutely hates here, apparently. But the Canadian has still more reasons to smile than sulk abou,t as he’s back into the Top 10 and is so close to making it to the ATP Finals.
Carole Bouchard, The Tennis Sweet Spot: So, Felix, first of all, the big question that everyone is asking themselves is, how is it going? What exactly was the problem in Basel?
Felix Auger-Aliassime: It was the knee in particular. Obviously, a problem that I had in the past, especially in 2023. It’s the pain that comes back. I think I have scars that are starting to be quite present in my career over the years. But in any case, it’s recovering well. These last few days, today, I trained, and I felt good.
So, everything should be OK, but it’s going to be something to manage, for sure. I’m
