Stefanos Tsitsipas and Felix Auger Aliassime are among the most representative players that will play Patrick Mouratoglou’s Ultimate Tennis Showdown (UTS).
Patrick is well-known by many as the “coach of Serena Williams.” However, the Frenchman is also a smart businessman that has founded an extremely successful Academy in the South of France besides launching some other businesses.
The UTS and reforming tennis
Mouratoglou has always stated that tennis has to be improved and it is worrying that the average age of fans is 61. Therefore, Patrick is aiming at attracting a younger audience with a new format proposed with the UTS and a key feature is that players will be allowed to express their emotions remaining genuine.
“For many years I have been worried about the future of tennis. The average age of a tennis fan is 61, which is very old for a fan base Tennis is failing to renew its fanbase. And that’s very worrying because the future doesn’t look bright,” he said to Reuters.
Patrick says that a mojo that was created by the likes of Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe in the 70s and 80s has been lost because showing emotions is “repressed” in modern tennis.
The UTS will also be played without fans with extensive use of the technologies. It will start this upcoming weekend and it will award points and proper prize money. The encounters will be staged at the Mouratoglou’s Academy.
Tsitsipas, Felix-Auger Aliassime and the UTS
Stefanos and Felix are among the most representative players of the so-called nextgen are both going to play the Ultimate Tennis Showdown.
During a recent interview with Tennis Majors, Stefanos expressed his happiness to join the competitions saying that it can help to modernize tennis.
“I believe the UTS is going to provide something fresh. And it’s also a way to change our sport. An evolutionary product. Which is going to open new doors and make tennis a bit more modernized and more updated,” he said.
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While Stefanos has been training for long at the Mouratoglou’s Academy, he has been only recently joined by Auger Aliassime. Here a clip of them training together.
Safe to say @StefTsitsipas and @felixtennis haven’t forgotten how to tennis!* 👌
*except for the last shot of the video 🙃 pic.twitter.com/N3VMdxDnds
— Mouratoglou Tennis Academy (@MouratoglouAcad) May 20, 2020
Stefanos Tsitsipas in 2020
Ranked world no.6, Stefanos played his last match on the 7th of March when he beat Jeson Patrombon 6-2 6-1 in the Rubber 4 of the Davis Cup.
This year Stefanos has a 11-5 win-loss record. Tsitsipas has won 1 title in Marseille. The Greek was the finalist in Dubai.
Felix Auger Aliassime in 2020
Currently ranked no.20, Auger-Aliassime played his last match on the 26th of February when he was defeated by Kyle Edmund 6-4 6-4 in the 2nd round in Acapulco.
Felix Auger Aliassime’s best accomplishment of this season was getting to the final in Rotterdam and Marseille.
Stefanos Tsitsipas and Felix Auger Aliassime played each other 4 times. The head to head is 2-2. The last time that they locked horns, Stefanos Tsitsipas won 6-3 6-4 in the final in Marseille (Open 13 Provence) on the 23rd of February 2020.
In the following video you can watch the key moments of their match.
