The French Open dates are the headache, as it starts 24 May and ends 7 June.
The options are:
End May PoM period before the FO starts ie May PoM ends 23 May, making it a 3 week period. June would then be a 5 week period ending 28 June ie end of Eastbourne.
Or
May period carries on through end of the FO is 7 June, making May 5 weeks and the June period gets squeezed to 3 weeks.
Or
We end May at the actual end of May and make it and June both 4 weeks - but that would be halfway through the FO and so the FO gets split in two.
Splitting performance in a slam is something i dont like, it becomes very clunky as it confuses things enormously. So either we have a 5 week May and a 3 week June or a 3 week May and a 5 week June.
Last season the dates fell differently and the equivalent end of month conundrum was around end of April and where the Madrid event and weeks should fall. This time its shifted to a May/June conundrum.
As I dont need to resolve it just yet, I wont, but it feels like the option is a May 3/June 5 or May 5/ June 3 one.
At this point, my feeling instinctively, particularly with FO qualies in the mix is to make May 5 weeks and June 3. This means the clay season is all in May and grass falls into June, with the exception of the challenger at Birmingham that kicks things off on the grass.
The things I think about, eh?! Opinions are, of course, always welcomed.
-- Edited by JonH on Wednesday 18th of March 2026 07:44:08 AM
First 3 months of the season and 28 different players have been nominated for a PoM nomination. Only 1 player of those has been nominated twice, Sofia Johnson. All the players this month are "newbies", so to speak.
Sofia Johnson remains the only player with 3 nominations so far this season, but now Alfie Hewett and Cam Norrie move onto 2.
As per past seasons, the PoS process will have a wildcard nominations and voting process to determine qualifiers for PoS not getting into the vote through their PoM performance or grand slam titles; two of the nominations to be in the wildcard vote (unlimited number can be nominated) will go to the player not qualified for PoS who has the most PoM nominations over the season, and also to the player not qualified with the most event titles won over the season.
Currently that would put Sofia into the wildcard vote and Charles Broom, also, with most titles to date. A lot could change of course as we are only 1/3rd of the way into the season, and both of those could get into PoS directly and avoid the wildcard vote.
Ive conferred and discussed with an esteemed board colleague and decided we will go with May as being 3 weeks and June as 5 - the May period will end as FO starts and the Birmingham grass event will be aligned
To the June grass season. So look out for a shorter month next month.