ITF Against The Opinion of Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic To Merge Davis and ATP Cup

The Goliaths of tennis, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic proposed to unite the two nation-based events, namely, ATP and Davis Cup. Considering the opinions of the top-notch men of tennis, Keilly Fairweather from the International Tennis Federation (ITF) spoke about the same subject.

Fairweather believes it wouldn’t be an ideal move to merge the historic and 119-year-old event of tennis, Davis Cup with the recently introduced team contest, the ATP Cup. 

“Obviously, we have to be sensitive to all different parties. But if you’ve got Novak saying that, that hopefully opens the door for a discussion with the ATP. From an ITF point of view, wouldn’t it be fantastic to also have a joint men’s and women’s World Cup together? That would be sensational,” Fairweather told BBC.

However, there are pros and cons to everything, if Davis Cup establishes its connections with ATP Tour, it would gain much more recognition and broadcasting the tournament on television channels would be uncomplicated.

“It’s an ambition. I think if you look at the business plan, the fourth year is really where we as partners are hoping to see this turn into a profit-making venture. There are areas in particular on the media rights side that have a huge amount of room for growth,” Fairweather continued expressing his thoughts.

Further, he mentioned his thoughts on Gerard Pique’s backed event, Davis Cup Finals 2019 which took place in Madrid, Spain.

“Gerard [Pique] really wants to be innovative, he wants to really provide an incentive for the players to come and do something different, which is not the week in, week out on tour events. The mixed team event has a huge amount of potential, and that’s something that we want to capitalize on,” said Fairweather.

In Madrid, the Spanish tennis team clinched their sixth Davis Cup title, after the legendary tennis player, World Number one, Rafael Nadal defeated Denis Shapovalov in the second singles rubber.