The ATP is inconsistent, too

The WTA gets a lot of flack for inconsistency, but the ATP will soon be similar

The modern WTA is often dismissed and criticised for its inconsistency. The top players don’t win the big titles, you are more likely to see them losing in the early rounds. It has become unsurprising to see many of the top 10 fall before the second week of a major.

At the same time as the WTA is mocked and ridiculed, the ATP is held up for the consistent results. Always a comparison between the two tours to deride the women’s game and uphold the men’s. Such comparisons feel oversimplified and often times cynical. It feels a lot more like people are finding reasons to ignore women’s tennis than they are giving genuine criticism.

The WTA has brilliant depth despite that inconsistency as the week just gone in Canada shows. Simona Halep won the title in Toronto to re-enter the top 10. A former world number 1 and 2-time grand slam champion in the top 20 being able to make a run like that is a huge sign of the depth of the tour. In the draw of almost every WTA500 or WTA1000, you will find multiple grand slam winners you will have to get through to win. Jelena Ostapenko had to beat 4 number of major winners on route to the title in Dubai earlier in this year.

There are few “bad” losses on the WTA- you get beaten by Halep? Well, she is still a huge threat and no one can begrudge you for losing to someone who has been dominant in women’s tennis for most of the last decade. The runner-up, Beatriz Haddad Maia, took out world no.1 Iga Swiatek in the third round in a 3 hour match. She was on the cusp of the top 20 after a brilliant grass season winning multiple titles (X) and now is a fully fledged top 20 player. She herself had to slay a fair few giants to get here.

Many might still dismiss this and call the field Halep and Haddad Maia were up against “weak”, but those who do will not have had any reprieve by watching the ATP in Montreal the same week. There, Pablo Carreno Busta won his first ever Masters 1000 by beating Hubert Hurkacz who was trying to get his second after winning Miami in 2021. It was still a good tournament and a great final, but it shows the growing inconsistencies on the men’s side too.

Pablo Carreno Busta with his Montreal title. Source: Reuters

Defending champion and world no.1 Daniil Medvedev lost his first match in Round 2 against Nick Kyrgios. Much like the giant-slayers, you wouldn’t call this a completely awful loss. Kyrgios has come off a title in both singles and doubles in Washington the week before and was in great form. He pushed Medvedev and won rather comfortably in the third set.

The top 3 seeds (Medvedev, Alcaraz and Tsitsipas) all lost in their first matches. It’s the first time the top 3 seeds have been out at this stage of a Masters 1000 since 1999 Indian Wells. So much for consistency, hm?

In the semi-finals, we had Hurkacz beating Casper Ruud in only his second hard court Masters 1000s semi-final (the first coming in Miami this year) and Dan Evans losing to the eventual Spanish champion. Carreno Busta also beat a qualifier in the quarter-final in the form of British youngster Jack Draper who has been having a brilliant rise this year.

All those results feel a bit…WTA-esc, don’t they? Top players who are out of form and struggling being beaten by good, plucky underdogs lower in the top 100. I would not call any of the loses or runs in this tournament “bad” or really that unexpected. Ruud has been improving on hard courts as that Miami run showed us. Carreno Busta has 2 US Open semi-finals and an Olympic bronze medal from 2021 on hard too. Hurkacz has a Masters title and can easily be a threat on hard courts even if he goes under the radar. Medvedev has been having a poor year by his standards even if he has become the world no.1. Alcaraz has the growing pains any 19 year old will have as he deals with expectations to win- he also had a match point in the second set tiebreak against Tommy Paul. Tsitsipas has similarly been inconsistent and having a struggle of a year and a player who has been so steadily improving this year in Draper isn’t a terrible loss.

Slowly over the past year or so we have been seeing more inconsistencies on the ATP-side arising, at Masters level and below at least (we will address slams, don’t you worry). Miami 2021 had Hurkacz and Jannik Sinner in the final. Toronto 2021 had big server Reilly Opelka losing to Medvedev and the October Indian Wells had a Cam Norrie against Nikolas Basilashvili final. This year’s Indian Wells had Taylor Fritz winning it, Casper Ruud a finalist in Miami and Alejandro Davidovich Fokina a finalist in Monte Carlo. The top 10 players are still reaching the latter stages and winning titles, but those miracle runs are becoming all the more common.

Cam Norrie with his 2021 Indian Wells title. Source: ATP

The theme of a lot of these more random results and champions is the lack of the Big 3 at these tournaments. When Djokovic and Nadal don’t play the Masters, those lower ranked players that might otherwise get swatted aside in the early rounds get to make a mark.

Many of those who support and watch the WTA have pointed out those belittling the randomness that it will come to the men’s side too. Finally, we are beginning to see that take shape. The consistency in men’s tennis was generated by the Big 4 and then, after Murray’s hip injury, the Big 3. They were the gatekeepers, the ones in the latter stages of every Masters event or major. It is important to remember that the consistency of the Big 3 is the outlier, not the norm. Men’s tennis was inconsistent before the Big 3 arrived and it will be the same once they leave. Once Djokovic and Nadal retire, this inconsistency will be the norm.

However, there is an outlier to those inconsistency narratives and that comes in the slams. At the Australian Open this year, we had 4 top 10 players in the semi-finals (Nadal, Berrettini, Medvedev and Tsitsipas). At Roland Garros, we had 3 (Nadal, Zverev, Ruud). On the women’s side, only a single top 10 player (Iga Swiatek) made it to the 4th Round. The Masters are producing inconsistency with top players losing early, but the slams are not.

The reason for this is the key difference in format between the men’s and women’s game. Men play best of five sets at slams, women best of three. Having to play more sets gives the top players a huge advantage.

In the WTA, losing the first set in slams puts you at a huge disadvantage and in a very tough position. You cannot make any mistakes from there on in or you are out. On the men’s side, dropping a set isn’t a big deal. Novak Djokovic lost the opening set in 4 of his 7 Wimbledon matches and won the title with ease. He found himself 2 sets to love down in his quarter-final against Sinner who was playing at his absolute peak. When Sinner’s level dropped, he took control. If this was best of three, Djokovic would have been out there and then to a player peaking for two sets. That is the reality of a lot of women’s tennis. Strangely enough, it’s easier to win two sets against top players than it is to win three.

There have been a lot of matches at slams this year where those top 10 players have benefitted from the best of five format. Zverev found himself two sets down against Sebastian Baez in Round 2 of Roland Garros. Tsitsipas was two sets down in his opening match against Lorenzo Musetti. Felix Auger-Aliassime, who ended up taking Nadal to 5 sets in Round 4, was also two sets to love down in his opening round match. Auger-Aliassime was two sets up against Medvedev in their Australian Open quarter-final. Nadal won that 21st slam in Melbourne coming from two sets to love down against Medvedev in the final.

The AO 2022 final will forever be remembered as one of the greatest comebacks of all time. A comeback only possible in best of five sets.

There are countless examples from slams this year where these players have gotten away with bad performances and survived inspired spells from their opponents because of the nature of best of 5. You have to be consistent for a much longer spell to beat players in best of 5- no one can play lights-out tennis for 3 consecutive sets. This has been utilised by the players at the top of the men’s game well, particularly Djokovic. The Serb has never won a grand slam without dropping a set (something Federer and Nadal have achieved multiple times) and I think part of it is because of his match management. He is happy to cede the odd set here or there because he knows he can save his energy. Against Sinner this year, there was no panic when two sets down. He knew Sinner could not keep up the frightening level he was producing.

The women do not get such a luxury. The women’s finals at grand slams feel far more tense and nerve-wracking than the men’s. Any error and you are a set away from losing the final. Djokovic meanwhile looked completely unphased when Nick Kyrgios took the opening set off him in the Wimbledon final this year.

But, even at slams, that ATP inconsistency is beginning to creep in ever so slightly. 33 year old Marin Cilic made the semis of Roland Garros which came as a shock to most of us. He is much more known for his success on hard and grass courts with clear decline in his results over the recent years. But he was playing near-perfect tennis almost all tournament with no one able to touch him reminding you exactly why he is a grand slam champion. Wimbledon too had those below the elite surging with Cam Norrie a semi-finalist and Nick Kyrgios a finalist (with the help of Nadal’s semi-final withdrawal). A former grand slam champion in their 30s making an inspired run? Well, that sounds very modern WTA.

Cilic’s performances all tournament were spectacular, but the 5th set tiebreak against Rublev was something else. The Russian didn’t put a foot wrong but lost it 10-2

To be clear, there is nothing wrong with this inconsistency. I really love the WTA in its current form! The top players might lose early, but there is still a dominant world no.1 and a crazy amount of depth. There are plenty of exciting young players rising through the rankings and a lot of older former grand slam champions who will always be a threat.

The ATP doesn’t have quite the same level of depth at the moment, but it’s not exactly doing badly. The likes of Auger-Aliassime, Alcaraz, Sinner, Musetti and Holger Rune are all in their early 20s or late teens and will surely be dominating the tour in years to come.

The WTA is in a generational shift, one massively accelerated by the pandemic and retirement of Ash Barty. The ATP’s shift has been far slower, helped by the more gradual decline and move away from the Big 3 and the slower improvements by the next generations. When they inherit the tour, they will do so with much more ease than the players at the top of the women’s game have been able to.

Regardless of generation, I think there will always be more natural consistency at the top end of the ATP because of the grand slams and the best of 5 format. Unless the WTA are able to push for the same on the women’s side, this will always be true.

The Big 3 have been superhuman with their longevity and levels of consistency in grand slams and on the tour over almost two decades, but it is finally time to begin to come back down to Earth.