No format change in Barclays ATP World Tour Finals

Dubai: The format of the season-ending Barclays ATP World Tour Finals will remain unchanged.

"This tournament is very prestigious and to win the title you have to beat five of the top eight players. It is a true test to find out the best player from among the best at the end of the season. I think it is one of the greatest tests in tennis. The present format just works fine and I doubt we will change the current format," Brad Drewett, the ATP CEO and Tournament Director for the ATP's year-end event, told Gulf News.

"Besides it has worked very well over a long period of time, so I really don't think we should touch the format for the moment at least," he added.

Under the present format, the top eight in the singles and doubles are divided into two groups and play three round-robin matches against the other three in their group. From there, the two players with the best records in each group progress to the semi-finals with the winners meeting in the final to determine the champion, who stands to win up to 1,500 ranking points.

"Right now men's tennis is in a very exciting position. We have amazing tennis being played on the court by great names, great stars, great personalities. We have one of the greatest rivalries sport has ever known between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal along with other great players like Novak Djokovic, Andy Murray, Andy Roddick, Gael Monfils and Tomas Berdych. These are players who excite the crowds and it is great for tennis to have so many wonderful players and personalities," Drewett said.

After a successful four-year run in Shanghai, the championships moved on to the O2 Arena in London from 2009, where Great Britain's Andy Murray just fell short of qualifying for the semi-finals due to him winning less number of games during the round-robin.

Crown jewel

"The Barclays final is the jewel in the crown for us all and a combination of the entire year. This is also something that the players all desperately want to qualify for. Everything about this tournament is good," Drewett observed.

"The round-robin format of eight players works well. The fact that the players have unbelievable match-ups is quite exciting to everyone. And the success of this event in the last five or six years, first in Shanghai and now in London, has been seen," the tournament director added.

"This year's tournament has nearly been sold out. It is being held [till 2012] at one of the great venues in the world.

"We have 35,000 people a day coming in for all eight days. I don't think we can do too much better."