Patrick Mouratoglou and UTS: From roots to polished event
Join us for an inside look into how Patrick Mouratoglou and his team planned the first edition of Ultimate Tennis Showdown. Discover how UTS co-founder presented the rules and features of this innovative format to the players.
Patrick Mouratoglou has realised a dream by bringing the Ultimate Tennis Showdown to life in 2020. During one of the most difficult times that the sport has ever seen, in the throes of a global pandemic, the founder of the Mouratoglou Tennis Academy has poured all his passion into a safe and innovative event, and one that could shape the game from this point forward.
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The event that has become known for experimentation started with quite a bit of trial and error. It took time before Mouratoglou and the rest of his team ironed out the details of the competition, from which UTS cards to put in play to which players to invite to the first staging.
Already UTS, which has featured big-name stars such as Stefanos Tsitsipas, Dominic Thiem, Matteo Berrettini, Alexander Zverev and many others, has been a welcome addition to the tennis calendar at a time when fans desperately need something to smile about.
Even better, there are plans to incorporate the competition into the tennis calendar of the future, long after the tours resume.
Mouratoglou says the feedback he has received from players has been very positive.
“I’m very happy. It was a concept, then the concept becomes reality and most of the time there is a huge difference between what you had imagined and the reality. In this case not so much. We had a lot of question marks. Will the players like the format? Will they enjoy playing and doing things on a court that they usually don’t, like having an interview during the changeover, or coaching during the match? We didn’t know how players would deal with it. They have loved it. They have really done it 100 percent and they have said that they would like to play UTS again in the future, as soon as possible. So that was a very positive feedback.”
