Queen’s Club Has Launched A Search For New Tournament Director

Written by: Bob Larson Tennis on 1st March 2014

Queen’s Club Has Launched A Search For New Tournament Director

epa03741729 Britain's Andy Murray touches the grass after complaining to the umpire that the grass was too wet to play during his second round match with Nicolas Mahut of France at the Aegon Tennis Championships at the Queen's Club in London, Britain, 12 June 2013. EPA/ANDY RAIN |

Chris Kermode’s appointment as the ATP World Tour’s Executive Chairman and President has left a vacancy as Tournament Director of the Aegon Championships, the London grass court event that is long established in the Wimbledon build up and next year elevates to a 500 series. The current front-runners in the race appear to former British player and respected television commentator Mark Petchey and current doubles star Ross Hutchins.

The appointment of 29 year-old Hutchins makes perfect sense to many within the Lawn Tennis Association who own the tournament. However he still believes he has several years of playing on the ATP World Tour after being allowed to return to the competitive fray after a year of cancer treatment following his diagnosis with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.

Hutchins has a pristine reputation in British tennis circles and despite battling his illness last summer, showed admirable powers of leadership and organization with the Rally Against Cancer event held at the Aegon Championships on finals day. He worked very closely with Kermode who repeatedly stressed his admiration.

Petchey, at 43 years of age, would be perfect for the role having encountered tennis from a variety of different angles; player, coach, administrator and now lead commentator with both Sky Sports and BBC. However he was vehemently critical of the LTA under former chief executive Roger Draper and many who remain in the association’s hierarchy see him as something of a loose cannon.

Both men have the bonus of being close confidantes of Britain’s leading player Andy Murray who has a long standing contract to contest the event he has twice won until the end of his playing career. Petchey was one of Murray’s early coaches and still has a good relationship with the influential Wimbledon and Queen’s Club champion while Hutchins is one of his most trusted friends.

Kermode led the Aegon Championships team from 2007 and his glowing reputation amongst the leading players contributed greatly to the campaign to secure his appoint with the ATP World Tour at the tail end of last year.

Kermode mixed operational expertise with an ability to draw a high-quality player field in the face of pressures from the LTA to reduce costs at the same time as the Gerry Weber Open in Halle, Germany, its challenger in the week after the French Open, offered more than generous guarantees to entice the pick of the men’s crop to play there instead.

For Michael Downey, the new chief executive of the LTA, the choice of director is crucial. The tournament’s prestige rises next year as it is granted the status of a 500-point ranking event by the ATP (from its present 250), which will mean the tournament director needs to placate Queen’s Club members in the face of demands for increased capacity at the same time as securing the quality of players commensurate with its new standing.

Petchey said: “From the moment I knew that Chris was moving on to head the ATP, I told the people involved that I’d be keen to talk about the job. I’m serious about it and I believe I could do it well.”

Meantime more than 70 staff have left the Lawn Tennis Association since the beginning of last summer as part of a quiet cull that will see more departures in the coming six months as new chief executive Michael Downey settles into his new job.

The job cull is part of a concerted effort to cut expenditure and trim some of the excess from the governing body, whose numbers and outgoings ballooned under Downey’s predecessor Roger Draper.

Topics: 10sballs, AEGON Championships, Andy Murray, Atp World Tour, Chris Kermode, Lta, Mark Petchey, Queen's Club, Ross Hutchins, Sports, Tennis

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10sBalls_com says:

March 1, 2014 at 9:44 am

Queen’s Club Has Launched A Search For New Tournament Director- http://t.co/3y1O1xX1u5 #Queens #Club #tennis #news
EastbourneEvent says:

March 1, 2014 at 11:59 am

RT @10sBalls_com: Queen’s Club Has Launched A Search For New Tournament Director- http://t.co/3y1O1xX1u5 #Queens #Club #tennis #news