Sherlock
Rookie
Much has been made by classical tennis afficiandos about how the lack of grass court tournaments, and the change in the type of grass used (firmer, higher bouncing) leading to the death of serve and volley tennis. I was also on this bandwagon for a long time, and while I of course don't wish for a return to all serve and volleyers, I would like to see a longer grass court season.
In fact, this is not the case! With the recent addition to the ATP World Tour site of the "Reliability Zone" you can now check career records of players by surface easily. The first thing I noticed was that the number of matches played on grass by top players, while slightly less, is not significantly less. Notice, for example, that Federer has played 110 grass court matches, while the leader is Jimmy Connors with 203 in his lengthy career. An earlier player with a normal career length, like John Newcombe played 149 grass court matches.
However, if you instead check out the number of carpet matches played, the difference is enormous. John McEnroe played 410 matches on carpet, Boris Becker played 322, Arthur Ashe played 279, and even as recently as 10-15 years ago Pete Sampras played 188. By comparison, the only current players in the top 30 for win percentage on this surface are Roger Federer, Ivan Ljubicic, and Nikolay Davydenko. Federer has played 69, Ljubicic 79, and Daydenko 52. Measly!
When you combine this with the recent success of serve and volleyer Michael Llodra in the Paris Masters, one of the very few remaining carpet tournaments, as well as other anecdotal successes by serve and volleyers on this surface, it becomes more obvious that the death of serve and volleyers on the pro tour more closely follows the decrease in the number of carpet tournaments and not the number of grass court tournaments.
Yes, I agree that the changes in strings have also contributed to this, because it has not added a whole lot to serve and volley proficiency, but has dramatically improved returns and groundstrokes. However, there is still some success by serve and volley players on carpet, much more success than has been seen on grass. To me, this implies that were there as many carpet tournaments now as there were 20 years ago, serve and volleyers would have more success and that gamestyle could be supported on the pro tour.
From now on, when I wish for more equality in the representation of tennis styles in tennis I will no longer wish for more grass court tournaments, but instead more carpet tournaments.
What are your thoughts?
In fact, this is not the case! With the recent addition to the ATP World Tour site of the "Reliability Zone" you can now check career records of players by surface easily. The first thing I noticed was that the number of matches played on grass by top players, while slightly less, is not significantly less. Notice, for example, that Federer has played 110 grass court matches, while the leader is Jimmy Connors with 203 in his lengthy career. An earlier player with a normal career length, like John Newcombe played 149 grass court matches.
However, if you instead check out the number of carpet matches played, the difference is enormous. John McEnroe played 410 matches on carpet, Boris Becker played 322, Arthur Ashe played 279, and even as recently as 10-15 years ago Pete Sampras played 188. By comparison, the only current players in the top 30 for win percentage on this surface are Roger Federer, Ivan Ljubicic, and Nikolay Davydenko. Federer has played 69, Ljubicic 79, and Daydenko 52. Measly!
When you combine this with the recent success of serve and volleyer Michael Llodra in the Paris Masters, one of the very few remaining carpet tournaments, as well as other anecdotal successes by serve and volleyers on this surface, it becomes more obvious that the death of serve and volleyers on the pro tour more closely follows the decrease in the number of carpet tournaments and not the number of grass court tournaments.
Yes, I agree that the changes in strings have also contributed to this, because it has not added a whole lot to serve and volley proficiency, but has dramatically improved returns and groundstrokes. However, there is still some success by serve and volley players on carpet, much more success than has been seen on grass. To me, this implies that were there as many carpet tournaments now as there were 20 years ago, serve and volleyers would have more success and that gamestyle could be supported on the pro tour.
From now on, when I wish for more equality in the representation of tennis styles in tennis I will no longer wish for more grass court tournaments, but instead more carpet tournaments.
What are your thoughts?
