“Let the fans miss tennis for a while” – De Minaur and Ruud on tennis’s packed schedule

The busy schedule of life on the tennis tour is a constant topic for debate – and in the latest episode of UTS’s exclusive talk show ‘All on the Table’, dinner guests Alex de Minaur, Casper Ruud and Dominic Thiem aired their views at UTS Oslo.

“We’re almost the only sport that goes year round,” said The Demon. “Our off season is our pre-season.”

He speculated on how the schedule could possibly change: “You could do the whole year round, just less tournaments. Then [if] you have a good week, you can enjoy it. That’s the biggest thing. You lose so often in this sport that when you get to win one week, you don’t really have the chance to enjoy it because you’ve got to get ready for the next one.”

And The Ice Man had some suggestions on how the tour calendar could be thinned out, saying: “Paris has a Slam. I don’t think they need a 1000 indoor. I know tennis is big in France, don’t get me wrong, but if you really think about it, they have two weeks of unbelievable tennis in the summer.”

The Demon concluded by saying that more off-weeks would also be good for the fans.

“You’ve got to allow them to miss tennis for a while instead of it being non-stop, week after week. If you make them miss it for a little bit, you create a bigger audience, people are excited for Australia to start again. Now it’s like, ‘Jeez, here we go again, here comes another year.'”