Champions Tennis League will benefit Indian tennis in the long run: Vijay Amritraj
We are not competing with IPTL
Vijay Amritraj, in conjunction with the All India Tennis Association (AITA), has launched the Champions Tennis League (CTL) which is due to begin later this year. This comes on the back of Indian tennis star Mahesh Bhupathi launching the International Premier Tennis League (IPTL), his conceptualization modeled on the Indian Premier League (IPL), a few months back.
The launch of the CTL has resulted in it being pitted against the IPTL with the formats of the two tournaments being similar, but Amritraj insists that comparisons between the two leagues are futile and should be avoided.
"How do you counter something else, there are tournaments back to back. One tournament does not compete with the next tournament. The tournaments end up making a tour.
"The great thing here is that Mahesh has taken initiative to do international tennis across Asia, which is fantastic for Asian cities. We are doing it in India, which will be great for India cities, that's the key element and driving force," Amritraj said.
When asked about the reason for the CTL to be scheduled at around the same time as the IPTL, he said that they were left with no choice with there being very little window in the tennis calendar. With the Chennai Open being the only ATP tournament in India, Amritraj hopes that his endeavour will result in more cities in India getting exposure to high quality tennis.
"The international calendar is very full. It's difficult to get an ATP or WTA tournament, so when we were discussing this concept, we were trying to put it together so that we are able to get international tennis in different cities in India.
"We are exposing tennis, both domestic and international across the country. It's not one city. The problem is we have one ATP tournament in India for 18 years and that's in Chennai. It will be great to have international tennis in cities where people don't get to watch international tennis live," the 60-year old said.
It will benefit youngsters
The CTL will feature players ranked between 5 and 25, and it will also include a minimum of 18 Indian players out of which 12 will be from the junior level. Speaking about the benefits the young Indian players can derive, he said, "And it gives a chance to our juniors to gain experience by practicing and travelling together with the international players. And it gives encouragement to youngsters to play the sport. Playing across India is very important to promote tennis in the country at grassroots level as well."
Amritraj was keeping his cards close to his chest, refusing to reveal the identity of the team owners and the players, but he did confirm that five of the venues for the 10-day tournament are Delhi, Chandigarh, Mumbai, Bangalore and Chennai, while the sixth is yet to be decided.