Two of the most well known names in men’s tennis have both questioned the use of best-of-five set matches in grand slams in separate interviews.
Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic have both indicated that they would support the idea of reducing the duration of men’s matches to three sets. The same as women.Their comments follows the Wimbledon championships, which featured two marathon semi-final matches. Kevin Anderson required more than six hours to defeat John Isner. Meanwhile, Djokovic needed more than five hours to defeat Rafael Nadal in a match that went into the following day.
Murray was not playing at Wimbledon due to an ongoing recovery from a hip injury. He did, however commentate on Nadal’s quarter-final clash with Juan Martin del Potro for the BBC. Another match that went to five sets. During an interview with The New York Times, the Brit said his experience on the other side has changed his opinion about marathon matches.
“It was interesting watching it from a different perspective, and I picked things up like, ‘Oh my god, this match is incredibly long’,” Murray told the New York Times.
“As a player, I really like best-of-five. It’s been good to me. I feel like it rewards the training and everything you put into that. But then, when I sat and watched the match in the commentary booth, it was an amazing match, it was a brilliant match, but it was really, really long to sit there as a spectator for the first time.
“That evening I had a meeting planned and I missed my dinner. People who are sitting there during the week watching that, I don’t think you can plan to do that. A lot of people are going to be getting up and leaving the matches and not actually watching the whole thing. The people in the stadium loved it, but I don’t think it – as well, what happened in the semifinals – is good for tennis.”
Novak Djokovic has also spoken in favour of the shortening of grand slam matches during this week’s Western and Southern Open. Speaking on The Tennis channel, the former world No.1 was asked what the one thing he would change in the sport. The Serbian believes that best-of-three matches would appeal more to ‘a younger audience’ and attract more viewers to the sport.
“I would have in grand slams best-of-three because this new generation of tennis fans and Millennials, they don’t have a great attention span.” Djokovic told The Tennis Channel.
“They want things to happen very quickly. I think for the players as well and to attract more viewers of a younger audience, I think we need to keep matches dynamic and shorter.”
Not everybody agrees with the views of Murray and Djokovic. In a stark contrast, 20-time grand slam champion Roger Federer has said that he would like more five-set finals to be played on the tour.
“I would probably add more best-of-five set matches in finals (on the ATP Tour). In Masters 1000 tournaments I think we have the opportunities to have more five setters in the finals. Definitely so in the World Tour Finals.” Federer told The Tennis Channel earlier in the week.
“I think it is quite unfortunate on the ATP Tour that we don’t have any best-of-five set finals.”
There are currently no plans in place to change five-set matches in grand slams. Although Wimbledon is contemplating the introduction of a final set tiebreaker.