The Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) – the official governing physique of males’s skilled tennis – introduced on Friday that it’s going to strip Wimbledon of rating factors in 2022. The Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) quickly adopted swimsuit, as did the International Tennis Federation (ITF), asserting that they won’t be awarding factors for the juniors and wheelchair editions of the occasion.
The announcement got here within the wake of Wimbledon’s ban on gamers from Russia and Belarus following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The All England Club’s determination was met with condemnation from the likes of Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal on the time.
World No.2 and 2021 US Open champion Daniil Medvedev, and World No.7 Andrey Rublev might be neglected of the boys’s part of the draw. Big names like World No.7 and 2021 semifinalist Aryna Sabalenka and two-time Grand Slam champion Victoria Azarenka will even be neglected of the ladies’s part.
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It stays to be seen how the transfer will have an effect on the principle attracts at SW19 this yr. Four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka, based on the Guardian, has already revealed that she might not play, saying the oldest Grand Slam match “is more like an exhibition” with out rating factors.
Given what it continues to supply when it comes to each status and prize cash, the draw might properly stay stacked. World No.1 Novak Djokovic has already confirmed he’ll arrive in London to defend his title.
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Djokovic was one of many extra vocal critics of Wimbledon’s determination in April. While talking after his first-round victory on the French Open, the Serb praised the ATP and the gamers for getting collectively and displaying a Grand Slam occasion that there are penalties to a “mistake” they could make. The 20-time Major champion added that it’s a “lose-lose” state of affairs for everybody.
How do the rankings work?
Simply put, rating factors are essentially the most precious forex in skilled tennis. Each weekly record of rankings represents the entire factors awarded to gamers over the past 52 weeks. Following the conclusion of every match, gamers are awarded rating factors they win on the occasion, and drop the factors they gained on the identical occasion the earlier yr.
A excessive rating gives quite a few privileges on tour. The 32 highest-ranked gamers are given seeds forward of a Grand Slam thereby guaranteeing they won’t be enjoying one another for the primary two matches. At some non-Slam occasions, higher-ranked gamers are awarded byes within the first spherical.
Both males’s and girls’s Grand Slam occasions award 2000 rating factors to the winner. The runner-up of the boys’s occasion receives 1200 factors and the ladies’s occasion receives 1300. Semifinalists obtain 720 and 780 factors respectively.
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The eight gamers that earn essentially the most factors in a calendar yr additionally take part within the year-end ATP and WTA tour finals, which award factors for every win and a complete of 2000 rating factors for the title.
Novak Djokovic sits on the prime of the boys’s rankings with 8660 factors in the mean time, whereas Iga Swiatek leads the WTA rankings with 7061 factors.
How will Wimbledon have an effect on the rankings?
In addition to not having the chance to win factors, gamers will even be dropping factors from final yr. No matter what the result, Djokovic, who has no factors to realize because the defending champion, might be dropping 2000 factors.
The transfer works within the favour of the likes of Russia’s Daniil Medvedev, who is simply defending 180 factors from his Round 4 end at SW19 final yr, and Rafael Nadal, who missed the occasion final yr on account of harm. Medvedev is confirmed to usurp the highest spot of the ATP rankings from Djokovic on July 11.
A hand harm has saved final yr’s finalist Matteo Berrettini out of motion all through the clay season. The Italian has timed his comeback on tour to play a full grass season, however the lack of factors at Wimbledon might pressure him to fall as little as fifteenth within the rankings. Denis Shapovalov – reeling from his first-round loss to Holger Rune on the French Open – will even face a serious hit.
While 2021 champion Ash Barty might have retired, the Wimbledon level freeze will affect the highest of the ladies’s rankings as properly. Last yr’s finalist and World No. 8 Karolina Pliskova dangers falling out of the highest 20 of the ladies’s rankings as issues stand. Belarus’ Aryna Sabalenka has already dropped to seventh within the rankings after a lacklustre clay season, and can lose one other 780 factors.
