But yes, it will be really interesting to see what difference this revised structure makes. I'm wondering about two things. First, if the aim is to reduce the numbers of men and women who have ATP/ WTA ranking points to about 750 of each, I wonder if there will be any real effort to extend more prize money downwards, so that more of these 750 can actually make a living from being a tennis pro. Second, I note that the wording is almost deliberately excluding those who feature only on the transition tours as being classed as 'professionals'. Therefore it seems to be saying that whilst you are competing (only) on the transition tour, you will not be making money to support yourself from tennis... and therefore our aim is simply to cut your costs, and try and provide you a leg up, if you are good enough, to the main tour. The interesting part of that is whether it will affect definitions of who is regarded as a tennis 'pro' or not. Since whilst those on the transition tours may be making small amounts of money, they will effectively still require sponsorship to be able to compete on that circuit, since they won't earn enough to support themselves.

And yes, great to see challenger qualifying wins finally gaining points...

That chart reminds me of things I used to draw with my Spirograph set when i was a kid.

Well for the women, it possibly disposes of the issue that it is nearly impossible to graduate from 15k tournaments to 25k tournaments, due to the quadruple points offered by 25ks.

Example, this week in Glasgow, the final acceptance per the entry list, Sherazad Reix has 210 points. The maximum mathematically possible to earn from 15ks is 16x12=192 points. So there's been a de-facto 2 tier system for several decades, and perhaps this needed formalising. It would have been better, in my view, to simply increase 15k points by around 50%.

Under the new system, 15k points count for zero towards your WTA ranking, which is worse; AFAICT, neither do WTA points count towards ITF entry points. What happens with players returning from injury? Are they back into the 25k+ stream, or starting in 15ks on zero points? How do you get relegated from 25ks, and are you then on zero transition points in 15ks?

My understanding is that the changes were initially driven by the problems of gambling on the lower tier events.  And whilst looking at ways of making lower tier events 'non-professional' and thus (I believe) outside of legal gambling operations they have also introduce other changes.  Making the junior rankings more relevant, reducing costs at the bottom, recognising the value of qualifying rounds on the ATP site, sorting out tournament length etc etc.

paulisi wrote:

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Has anyone worked this out yet?
ATP/WTA points carried over for 25K and higher tournaments. Rest go into a different point system.
Various exemptions offered for juniors and to ranked players.

Who will benefit most from a GB perspective?

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 Pretty much: Slightly different in mens and ladies.

 

Ladies - £25k and above events (main tour etc and bigger ITF events) have world ranking points (WTA), those below are in the transition tour and only get ITF transition tour points

 

Men - Main tour and Challenger and latter stages (not sure if 1/4s or 1/2s) of $25k events get ATP points. Challenger qualies, and early round $25k events and all $15k ITF events get ITF Transition Tour points. 

 

In ITF $25k ladies events, 5 places are reserved for top entries from the Transition Tour, sort of like super wild cards.

In the ATP, entries into Challenger events at qualifying level will be reserved for ITF points scorers, number of places reserved not yet known. 

And, yes, some junior places will be reserved. 

 

Who will benefit from the Brits; my gut instinct is that players hovering around the 300-400 mark will find themselves protected a little on Challenger events, with less players coming through to knock them off, so players in that ranking grouping, ie bottom end Challenger players or ITF $25k players will get to stick around at that level with less young upstarts knocking them off, but I could be wrong in that...  

paulisi wrote:

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Thanks for that
My thinking was that the likes of Beth Grey would jump up the domestic WTA rankings as she has picked up the majority of he points at 25ks and would probably jump ahead of Jodie, Freya, Sam, Eden and Tara.

The other positive is those who base themselves at weaker venues - Sharma, Antalya etc to bump up their current ranking will probably slide down the rankings.

Are there any shadow tables about?

-- Edited by paulisi on Thursday 26th of April 2018 04:49:48 PM

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 As I understand, these live rankings lists purport to show the shadow tables:

https://live-tennis.eu/en/itf-women-live-ranking

 

Jodie Burrage is the top GB lady at 41, Francesca Jones is at 51

 

https://live-tennis.eu/en/itf-men-live-ranking

 

jay Clarke is the top GB man at 85 and Ed Corrie down at 130 - presumably they have picked up points in Challenger qualies events?