New formats make tennis more exciting

The “Lawn Tennis” or preferably Tennis, originated in 19th century in England. With the passage of time, several changes were made to make the sport more interesting. In the 21st century where people don’t have much time and like to enjoy the shorter version of sports, some changes were needed again.

International Premier Tennis League

IPTL

The International Premier Tennis League (IPTL,officially the Coca-Cola International Premier Tennis League) is a team tennis league founded in 2013, that launched in November 2014, with teams in four Asian cities: Dubai, Manila, New Delhi and Singapore. Mahesh Bhupathi launched IPTL in 2013, with the motive to make Tennis more exciting. The league was modelled on the basis of the Indian Premier League, a T20 league in India, where the franchise teams plays against each other at home and away venues. The league was glittered with star players Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and legends like Fabrice Santoro and Andre Agassi. There were four franchises : Manila Mavericks, Indian Aces, UAE Royals and Singapore slammers.

New Rules

A match comprised of five sets of different category: men’s singles, women’s singles, men’s doubles, mixed doubles and legends singles. The first serve in the first set is determined by a coin toss. Each team can call a power point once in each set when receiving serve, and the next point played will count double. Effectively, a player trailing 15–0 can directly get to 15–30 by winning the power point.

The team with the most points at the end of the five sets wins the match. Each set is won when a team is the first to reach six games won. If the score is five-games-all, a timed five-minute shoot-out will be played. The player or doubles team leading at the end of five minutes wins the set.

The coach can substitute a player if he feels he is not playing upto the mark. At most, one substitution is allowed for both teams.

The team which wins the most games is declared as the winner. But if the other team is able to win the last set and level the games, then the match goes into a super-shootout. In the super-shootout, the trailing team and leading team play a five minutes timer and the team with most points at the end of the timer wins the match. Only men’s singles players feature in the super shootout.

The League was a huge success because of star players and new set of rules. The Indian Aces were the champions in the inaugural edition of the league.

Fast4 Tennis

Tennis for everyone

Fast4 tennis is "Tennis For Everyone”. Inspired from T20 cricket, it adds more excitement in tennis matches with some new set of rules. It follows the basic rules of traditional tennis along with some improvements in match timing and scoring opportunites. The format debuted in the exhibition match between Roger Federer and Lleyton Hewitt in Sydney. The World No.2 defeated his old rival 4-3, 2-3, 3-4, 4-0,4-3. The Australian authorities believe that this format will be enjoyable by both fans and the players. Hewitt said ahead of the match " It's a fantastic innovation for tennis, and one that I hope it will take off."

Shorter matches, new rules

FAST4 promises to be an exact medley of faster and traditional tennis. The first player to four games wins the set. There is no break for the changeover. In case of a deuce in a game, there is no-ad scoring. In case of the tiebreaker, no extra set will be played. It will end with the sudden death. In case of a doubles game, the receiver can decide, which player will return the serve.

In other words, this is the traditional tennis, but with some set of new rules, in order to lessen the time of matches and to make the game more interesting. The changes, that have been going in the tennis world, is surely propitious, and the future may be marked by one of such new formats.