ATP/WTA:”Blog of the week”: Between Görges triumph and cheap catwalk spectacle

While Julia Görges, with her triumph at the B World Championships in Zhuhai, provided the positive highlight of the week, the opening ceremony for the ATP NextGen finals was a half-silk draw spectacle.

Let’s start with the pleasant atmosphere of the past tennis week. The pleasant thing, not too hard to guess, is connected with the name Julia Görges: The 28-year-old Bad Oldesloerin, who has found her centre of life in Lower Bavaria, set the last big exclamation mark as the winner of the B World Championships in this women’s tennis season.

Unexpectedly, Görges, of all people, who had been in the shadows in recent years when the Kerbers, Petkovics and Lisickis hit the headlines, is now entering the next series in the travelling circus as the new national number one.

Nothing has to be impossible for Görges from January 2018. Especially if she continues to work in such a clearly structured way and now also feels that she can show the best tennis and win trophies in crucial situations. This, among other things, was their biggest deficit in all the months and years that followed their electrifying victory at the 2011 Porsche Grand Prix.

Görges had the power, the potential for top results, but often lacked the plan and precision for the jump to the front. Görges was what they call an underperformer in the industry. She often played far below her possibilities.

It’s a good thing that the 28-year-old gave her career a radical twist by leaving the well-trodden paths, reorienting herself fundamentally and also making it clear what she has to do with whom and how to be successful. Sounds simple, but is often very difficult. And for many, not as close as you might think.

Görges as the new number 1 in Germany, of course, is also Angelique Kerber – the woman who, twelve months ago in a festive mood, looked back on her dream year 2016. Where Kerber is heading now is one of the most difficult questions for 2018. For Kerber himself, it’s all about answering a crucial question for himself:”Do I now put my money on radical change? Or do I think that with the already successful Team Kerber, I can make the next turnaround?

Now for the less pleasant one. What the ATP hosted for the premiere of its NextGen finale in Milan, a semi-several, slippery draw spectacle, was so creepy that it could have been classified as a fake news at first. Months of preparation – and then this performance, which doesn’t just make a mockery of the tennis world: The question is whether it’s only with an apology from ATP boss Chris Kermode. Or whether those in charge will also have to vacate their posts.

The innovation, which was actually praiseworthy in itself, a showdown with the stars of tomorrow, first came into a completely crooked light. Now the players have to make sure that this tournament gets the attention it deserves. Namely, attention on the Centre Court – and not on an improvised, cheap-looking catwalk.