[moonglow]

Sorry, I forgot to post here at the time - think I put it in the Tennis News thread - that everything is cancelled until the start of the grass season. Wimbledon will decide this week at an emergency board whether to postpone or cancel. Once they’ve announced it’ll impact what happens - no Wimbledon no grass season.

Given what is going on in New York I’d be extremely surprised if the USO goes ahead.

Seeing a lot of suggestions that neither tour will resume - if at all - before December and that the traditional off-season could be used to pack in a lot of missed tournaments - probably the big ones like IW/Miami.

Yes you put it on the tennis news thread but I must have missed seeing your post at the time.
I can't imagine a summer without Wimbledon, Wimbledon's the mainstay of the tennis year and will be so much missed.  I think it will be cancelled but it isn't official yet.
& I'd be more than surprised if the USO went ahead, things in New York are so worrying.
I suppose they might play tournaments such as IW and Miami in December, but they'll all be very rusty, so these matches mightn't count for ranking points this time? 
I can't think ahead to December - surely things will be "normal" by then and hopefully a long time before.

[amongsttheleaves]

I find it very hard to believe that the virus won't be well out of the way long before then, particularly if all the measures put in place by our and other governments have the desired effect.  Nor can I see players playing a load of tournaments crammed into that period and then continue right on with the 2021 schedule, unless it too is amended.

I think a major issue is that players simply cannot train at all at the moment for the foreseeable future. A few like Andy have a gym etc at home, but that is not the norm. They've had longer off now than they usually would before pre-season training - typically they have two weeks rest at most before resuming training, IW was cancelled over three weeks ago now. Incidentally, IW reported its first two Covid-19 cases yesterday. Cancelling that tournament almost certainly slowed the spread of the virus in that area.

The players will need more time than normal once all this is over to re-implement their strength and conditioning work, to get hitting on the court again, to do all this in a managed way without injury, to be ready to play a slam at the end of August in a city which is currently the worst affected part of the US, seems a tall order to me. I'm even seeing some players say they won't return to the tour until a vaccine is available.

Chatter from the tennis writers is that Wimbledon is very likely to announce that it is cancelled on Wednesday. Pressure is on the French Open to officially cancel rather than attempt to play in Sept/Oct. The issue with the FO is that the president of the FFT will just try and do whatever he wants - he announced the postponement himself for example, not the FO director.

My main worry though is if that this prolonged gap should happen, then we could lose a lot of up and coming young players who will be forced to look for other employment in order to bring in the money to enable them to live, and that would be a tragedy for the sport - and tennis isn't the only sport which will suffer the same fate either.

The tours should be making funds available to these players - the tours pay a pension later in life for example - and who knows they might even be eligible to claim from government grants where available. I think we could see more tensions erupting between players and tournaments, but there does seem to be some attempt from the different parts which make up the sport.

[Aileen]

The tours should be making funds available to these players - the tours pay a pension later in life for example - and who knows they might even be eligible to claim from government grants where available. I think we could see more tensions erupting between players and tournaments, but there does seem to be some attempt from the different parts which make up the sport.

Thank you for that information.

[Aileen]

I'm pleased your dog is fine
Wimbledon are going to have a board meeting tomorrow (Wednesday) and sadly I do think they'll decide to cancel the tournament.  I don't see how it can go ahead really, there isn't long enough for the virus to have gone away.  There are too many risks in allowing the tournament to take place.  & the players would have second thoughts about it too.
It's all very depressing (:

It isn't only that but the fact that it takes two months to prepare for the tournament, something which with all these restrictions in place would be very difficult.  I agree though that a year without Wimbledon is depressing as if they aren't already depressing enough.

[Apollo]

Thanks needed that, they were fun to watch. Sad that Wimbledon is cancelled.

[waverlybear]

I forgot about this after posting about it yesterday.

https://www.atptour.com/en/news/djokovic-murray-instagram-live-april-2020


Did anyone see it?

[waverlybear]

Er ... did you ever have one of those days when you kept thinking it was Thursday only to discover it was Friday?   

I spent most of the day in the garden. Maybe too much fresh air.

[Aileen]

I put this piece of good news on the Tennis News thread but thought I'd put it here as well -

"The tennis governing bodies have joined forces to support lower-level professionals who are struggling financially during the sport's shutdown due to the novel coronavirus outbreak."

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/tennis/article-8231193/Tennis-bodies-join-forces-offer-financial-help-lower-tier-players-left-without-income.html