The goal of today’s blog is to help make a reader internet-savvy when it comes to professional tennis. There are a few key links that will make any tennis fan’s search for players, results and information quick and to the point.
First, http://www.wtatennis.com/page/Home/0,,12781,00.html is a must-have for results and draws of the biggest tournaments in women’s tennis. If you click on the address above, then go to the ‘Scores’ tab which is the second from the left, you will see the ‘Draws’ option scroll down and that is what will give you the qualifying, doubles and main draw singles draws of WTA events. On the WTA Tour Site above there is something that says Men and Women at the very top, and when the mouse is over it, the WTA and ATP Tour tournaments, plus their dates, scroll down. Clicking on a tournament takes you to the tournament website, which is not always an easy place to find draws, but the scroll-down gives a nice outline of all the WTA tournaments in a calendar year.
The men’s ATP Tour website is http://www.atpworldtour.com/ and to look for draws simply go under the ‘Scores and Stats’ tab which is the second from the left.
The WTA website is not a very good tool for finding information on rankings and player activity. This is because it is more focused on top-100 rankings when there are 800+ players with WTA rankings, many of them players who will, and have been, top-100. The easiest site in my opinion for players’ rankings and activity is www.itftennis.com . Down on the right-hand side, below all the multi-colored options, is a box that says ‘Find a Player.’ Typing in a players’ last name brings you to a list of all players (men and women both) with that last name. It shows Junior, Men’s and Women’s results. By clicking on the tab of the desired results next to your players name you can bring up a page with the following good information:
Career-high singles and doubles rankings
Current singles and doubles rankings
Year-end rankings (for every year they had a WTA/ATP Tour ranking)
Current year win/loss record
Birthdate
Then, by clicking on the ‘Activity’ tab you can see the past year’s tournament results in singles and doubles. Scores, opponents, rounds, dates and tournaments (ITF Pro Circuit plus ATP and WTA Tour events); it’s all there. I often scout potential doubles partners who I don’t know very well using this website to see who they’ve beaten and lost to, and what the scores were.
For during-tournament results (a tournament that is going on the current week and has not finished yet), if it’s a WTA tournament then http://www.wtatennis.com/page/Home/0,,12781,00.html is the place to go. For ITF tournaments, two places are good. American tournaments can be found at www.usta.com: go under ProTennis on the right top tab, then click USTA Pro Circuit also at the top in small lettering (which will bring you here: http://www.usta.com/Pro-Tennis/Pro-Circuit/USTAProCircuit/). Then on the right either the tournaments for the current week are posted or something that says, ‘No tournaments are posted, for info on this week click here,’ will show. And you want to click where it says, ‘here,’or on the tournament you wish to see. As an example, this is the website that shows the information for this week’s Pro Circuit event, where I am currently playing: http://www.usta.com/Pro-Tennis/Pro-Circuit/ResultsSchedules/ .The men’s and women’s qualifying, doubles, main draw singles draws, plus the schedules or ‘order of play’ are posted and can be clicked on.
For international tournaments and slower information on American ones, you have to go to www.itftennis.com and click on either the men’s or women’s circuit colored tabs on the right. There are three lists of tournaments:
Completed (from directly previous week if available)
Upcoming (coming week)
Current (going on the current week)
The lists include all of the ITF events that fall in those three time frames, plus sometimes also WTA and ATP Tour tournaments like Indian Wells and Miami (Sony Ericsson) that fall into those three time frames. Clicking on one gives you winners of singles and doubles, or you have to choose your category on the top right (qualifying doubles or singles, main draw singles or doubles) and if the draw and results are available they will scroll down once you have chosen the category. This is usually the worst way to get current results because it is not updated very frequently during each week for whatever reason.
When the players sign into the tournaments, they use a site called the WTA Playerzone. For WTA tournaments it costs about $200-$500 per year (depending on if you pay for a full WTA membership or just the ability to sign into the tournaments) to be able to use this website. It costs $500 per year for a full WTA membership, and without it a player must pay $150 every time he or she plays in a WTA Tour event. A player has to gage which is the cheaper option for him or her depending on the kind of schedule they intend to have in a year.
For signing into ITF tournaments, a player must pay $55.00 a year for an ID # called an IPIN. Then, they go to www.itftennis.com/ipin, sign in with their IPIN and password and sign into tournaments as well as view tournament information from there. A player can also withdraw from tournaments, far enough before certain deadlines, on this site. Otherwise they must fax a paper withdrawal sheet to the tournament site, and to the ITF headquarters in London.
Happy surfing!!
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