Push for Indian tennis is coming in small packages, leagues

Sumit Nagal, India’s top ranked male player, was acquired for Rs 18.5 lakh at a Tennis Premier League auction in October while some of the other high bids went to international players, like Ernest Gulbis, Dennis Novak and Maria Timofeeva. (Photo via X/@nagalsumit)

A couple of tennis leagues are trying to address the sport’s losing connection with audiences, motivate its players and bridge pay shortcomings, which has for long plagued Indian tennis players.

The on-going Pro Tennis League (PTL, December 7-10) in Delhi, will be followed by the Tennis Premier League (TPL, December 12-17) in Pune, both in their fifth seasons. The leagues’ intentions are to showcase Indian players and get audiences in through a T20—to use a cricketing analogy—version of the sport.

“We started the league after we had seen other leagues with international stars, and to popularise the game,” says Aditya Khanna, co-founder of the PTL. “Those were not financially viable, and we felt there was a gap with no league for Indian players. We wanted to close that gap, for Indian pros, juniors and seniors together in a shorter format.”

The PTL’s format of eight teams divided into two groups allows for 7-8 matches to be finished in three-odd hours. There are about 20-30 points in each match and whichever team has more points wins (not matches) triumphs, making every point crucial. The eight-team TPL also has a point-based play with a match between two teams worth 80 points. Each match has four games, men’s and women’s singles, men’s doubles and mixed doubles—each worth 20 points.

“The idea was to promote tennis and Indian tennis players,” concurs Kunal Thakkur, co-founder of the TPL. “Marketing people say fans are not interested in tennis unless there is a (Roger) Federer or a (Rafael) Nadal. We wanted to create a league that could get revenue for players and build them into brands.”

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Sumit Nagal, India’s top ranked male player, was acquired for Rs 18.5 lakh at a TPL auction in October while some of the other high bids went to international players, like Ernest Gulbis, Dennis Novak and Maria Timofeeva. The basic income for the Indian tennis player, Thakkur says of the TPL, comes to about Rs 8-10 lakh while the PTL income varies between Rs 1-5 lakh.

These two leagues draw their inspiration from others that sprouted in the past and faded away. Mahesh Bhupathi’s ambitious International Premier Tennis League (IPTL) started in 2014, had the world’s best players, including Federer, Nadal and Serena Williams, play in India and other parts of Asia. It ran a couple of seasons before running into financial difficulties. The IPTL, in part, did inspire the Federer-backed Laver Cup, which has the best six male players of Europe against six from the rest of the world. The Vijay Amritraj-backed Champions Tennis League (CTL) also had a brief run from 2014 before running into a disagreement with the All India Tennis Association (AITA) over finances.

Bhupathi, with other partners, recently started the World Tennis League (WTL), the second season of which will be held in Abu Dhabi from December 21-24. But that follows on the lines of the IPTL, with the world’s leading players like Aryna Sabalenka, Iga Swiatek, Elena Rybakina, Casper Ruud, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Andrey Rublev and Daniil Medvedev participating this season.

Both Khanna and Thakkur are aware of the delicate economics at play in running a league. Across sports in the country, leagues have cropped up and dropped out, inspired by the success of cricket’s Indian Premier League (IPL) but unable to match cricket’s popularity.

“We learnt a lot from IPTL,” Thakkur adds. “We understood that tennis has a limited market in India. If we get a Federer, we can’t recover costs. We decided to go slow from year one to three. Budgets are increasing every year. We don’t want owners to bleed a lot. Other than cricket, it’s difficult to recover costs (in any sport).”

“We have player and stadium costs, event management costs, which are lower,” says Abhijeet Dangat, PTL’s development business head. “It is difficult to raise money in sponsorship and team ownership. But we are making it sustainable. We have kept costs low.”

Khanna adds, “At this point of time, if I am able to raise that money, I would rather pay Indian players. For me, getting a global star of top 10 or 20 ranking will not get the crowd.”

Income for the leagues primarily comes though team ownerships, though both leagues have title sponsors. The PTL has no ticketing for fans. Their matches are streamed on Sportzworkz, as telecast rights come at a cost. The TPL, which will be broadcast on Sony, has got on board some recognisable movie actors, while Leander Paes is a co-owner of one of the teams.

With its long, relatively rich tradition in tennis, India has had a succession of successful players over the years, in singles and more recently in doubles. With the latest lot of Grand Slam winners in doubles and mixed doubles, Paes, Mahesh Bhupathi and Sania Mirza, retiring from the sport, a gap has remained with no immediate successors on the global stage. Rohan Bopanna, now well into his 40s, remains the only top player (world number three in doubles) from the country in world rankings.

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India’s top-ranked player Nagal, at No. 138, recently told PTI about struggling to keep himself going financially on the ATP Tour. While tennis has always been an expensive and competitive sport, it requires international travel and an increasing number of tournaments to be able to make enough ranking points, prize money and a sustainable career.

“We need to celebrate what we have (players),” says Khanna. “We need to celebrate them (current set of players) equally and more and within their circumstances. Once they are seen as stars, they will get more sponsorship to get to a bigger stage, which is what is needed. We have a small impetus in what we do.”