With the ATP Finals marking the last big showdown for the top eight male players, the 2024 tennis season is nearing its conclusion.
This event follows closely after the Paris Masters, which has recently announced a major format change set for 2025.
Alongside Paris, the ATP Tour is planning to extend several Masters tournaments to 12-day/two-week events, replacing the current seven-day format.
This expansion has stirred criticism, with Andy Roddick suggesting it may overburden players and disrupt the already packed schedule.
Stefanos Tsitsipas echoed these concerns on Thursday, voicing frustration over the extended schedule.
However in a rather unexpected turn, Stan Wawrinka was quick to call out the Greek for his hypocrisy, digging up some old comments made by the 26-year-old.
Stan Wawrinka exposes Stefanos Tsitsipas hypocrisy over new ATP debate
Tsitsipas has joined the growing opposition to the ATP’s plans to introduce longer Masters events, particularly in light of the ongoing debate over the tour’s scheduling and the congested calendar.
In response to Roddick’s claim that the change was ‘stupid’, Tsitsipas expressed his frustration on Thursday, stating on X: “The two-week Masters 1000s have turned into a drag. The quality has definitely dropped. Players aren’t getting the recovery or training time they need, with constant matches and no space for intense off-court work.”
He also criticized the ATP’s decision to commit to this format without fully understanding its impact on the schedule or the quality of events, pointing out that Paris got it right by sticking to a one-week format, which he described as ‘exciting and easy to follow’.
The 26-year-old insisted: “If the goal was to ease the calendar, extending every 1000 to two weeks is a backwards move. Sometimes, it feels like they’re fixing what wasn’t broken.”
However, a beady-eyed Wawrinka quickly pointed out the irony of Tsitsipas’s criticism, sharing a link above the Greek’s post to a past interview in which he had expressed nothing but enthusiasm for longer Masters events.
In a video with ATP Chairman Andrea Gaudenzi from two years ago, Tsitsipas was told about the plan to expand Masters tournaments, with the ATP aiming to extend events like Miami, Indian Wells, Madrid, Rome, and others to 12 days or two weeks.
In response, Tsitsipas had agreed: “In a way that also means the top 100 players are provided good financial support for their efforts annually,” he said.
“It’s a better structured way of having tournaments held together. It allows for more fans to be attending and watch their favorite players, whether thats a female or a male. They can get the whole package in one place,” the seemingly supportive Greek concluded.
With Tsitsipas having clearly changed his tune, it now adds another bizarre and rather funny layer to the central discourse dominating tennis at the moment.
The WTA and ATP scheduling debate remains rife
It’s arguable that Tsitsipas has simply changed his mind after being presented with new evidence – namely a more congested tennis schedule this year.
The impact in 2024 has been obvious, with countless players complaining, and some even calling an end to their seasons after losing their battle with injury.
Iga Swiatek raised the alarm over poor WTA scheduling at the Cincinnati Open, a 1000 hard-court event just weeks after the Olympics, that had taken place on clay, had concluded.
The stint in Paris is likely the cause of much hysteria on the tour, with the Olympics breaking up a transition from grass to the hard-courts, as well as coming before what is always a relentless North American swing.
While Tsitsipas’ latest gaffe is objectively rather hilarious, it perhaps does speak of a broader push-back against the ATP’s plan to prolong the calendar.
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