WHY MORE GRASS TOURNAMENTS ARE NEEDED IN THE BUILD-UP TO WIMBLEDON

(Getty/Simon Bruty)

As the curtain closes on another French Open, the eyes of the tennis world move from clay to the grass courts of Europe. 

Across the ATP and WTA Tours, there will be six tournaments each across the next three weeks. 

This three-week build-up has been in place since 2015, as previously players had just a fortnight of tournaments before Wimbledon began. 

Chris Kermode, the ATP Executive Chairman at the time, explained the rationale for the decision.

"The extended grass-court season, with additional Emirates ATP Rankings points at stake, is a positive step forward," he said.

"One of our assets as a sport is to provide for variance across playing surfaces throughout the season, so the strengthening of the grass court season is a significant enhancement for the overall calendar."

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It certainly was a positive step and was further strengthened with the addition of even more tournaments. 

In 2015, the men participated in five tour-level tournaments, while the women participated in four. Both have grown now to six. 

And it's a far cry from the two-to-three tournaments in a fortnight that existed a couple of decades ago. 

So it seems like everything is fine for the grass court season, right?

Well, not quite. 

It's still about clay on the ATP Challenger Tour

ATP Challenger tournaments are the level below the men's main tour, but are highly competitive.

Most Challengers will feature players inside or just outside the top-100. Points for a tournament win exceed those of making the semi-finals of ATP 250s.

In the next three weeks, there will be 12 Challenger tournaments, and you'd think a fair few would be on grass. 

Unfortunately, you'd be wrong, as 10 of them will be played on clay, which is 83 per cent. 

If we include the week just gone, which saw the first grass court Challenger of the year, that extends to 13 of the 16 tournaments. 

It certainly isn't grass court season at this level, it is still very much about the red dirt.

The impact on grass court opportunities

With very few weeks before Wimbledon and a small pool of tournaments, it is extremely competitive to get into these events.

The ATP level tournaments are all 32 draws, which means for events like Queen's and Halle, a top-50 ranking only scrapes you into the main draw.

While a top-100 ranking doesn't even guarantee you a qualifying spot. 

This is something Australians Adam Walton and James Duckworth face, who are currently outside the entry list of qualifying for both Queen's and Halle. 

This highly competitive entry list trickles down to the Challenger level.

At the two grass court Challengers in Ilkley and Nottingham, the last direct entries are ranked 193 and 137, respectively.

At the clay court tournament of the same monetary value, you could be ranked as low as No.284 to get in. 

Australian James McCabe is the last person into the Nottingham Challenger's qualifying at No.180 in the world. 

This means talented grass court players on the edge of the 200 mark risk missing much-needed tournament play leading into Wimbledon qualifying. 

This includes Australian Alex Bolt, who has a 71 per cent record on the surface and made the quarter-finals of the Birmingham Challenger last week. 

He is inside the world's top-200, but only scraped into the Ilkley tournament this week as an alternate and is likely to miss the cut next week in Nottingham. 

This has seen players like Bernard Tomic, whose game suits the grass, forced out of any guaranteed action on the surface this season. 

This lack of access to grass court action is also echoed on the women's side.

This week's first-ever Queen's tournament for women required a top-30 ranking to make the main draw. 

The one grass court WTA 125 event (equivalent to a challenger) this week requires a ranking of around 150.

After this week, there are no WTA 125 or ITF women's grass court events for players. 

What can fix this?

We can't fit any more weeks into the tennis calendar. 

However, with the few weeks that we have, there should not be more clay court tournaments across the top two levels of the sport. 

An increase in draw size to 48 at the top tournaments like Queen's, or even exploring making it a Masters event, can help expose more players Tour-level action. 

More players competing at the top level will open more opportunities in Challenger and WTA 125 tournaments.

Also, increasing the number of grass court challengers to two instead of one in some weeks seems like a “no-brainer” decision. 

Increasing the number of WTA 125 or ITF 100 events on the surface is also much needed. 

This will make these few weeks a true grass season instead of having more clay court tournaments at the top levels of the game.

It will give more opportunities to players coming through the ranks and to those who specialise on the surface. 

Because one thing the game isn't missing is the need for more clay court tennis. 

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