Patrick Mouratoglou outlines vision for a new future in Tennis365 exclusive interview

Patrick Mouratoglou has insisted he is not trying to re-write the tennis rule books with his bold new vision for the sport, but he believes a new era has already dawned following the success of his Ultimate Tennis Showdown (UTS) tournaments.

The year-round league was founded by coaching guru Mouratoglou, who previously coached WTA legend Serena Williams and has recently worked with Danish wonder kid Holger Rune.

Nick Kygrios was the star attraction at the latest UTS event in New York, with Alex de Minaur, Stefanos Tsitsipas and Andrey Rublev among those taking part.

French entertainer Gael Monfils took off the big prize in New York, with the excitement around the legendary Forest Hills Stadium confirming UTS has now arrived as a big force in tennis.

Finding space in a crowded tennis calendar for exhibition events is proving to be more challenging than ever, but Mouratoglou has told Tennis365 that the sport needs to open its eyes to a quick-fire format of the sport that has already captured the imagination of fans around the world.

Tickets for this year’s UTS Grand Final in London are already selling out fast and Mouratoglou believes UTS has only just started to realise its full potential.

“I had very high expectations at the start, so I can’t say this has gone even better than we expected, but there is no doubt it is going in the right direction,” Mouratoglou told Tennis365.

“When we first spoke about UTS, it was at a time when we couldn’t have any crowds during Civic, but everything changed when we could have the crowd involved.

“It is amazing to see how much the crowd get into it and UTS comes alive when you have a crowd interacting with the players during the events. They get crazy. I don’t feel like I’m at a tennis match and that’s exactly what I wanted when this idea started.

“You can get some amazing moments in a Grand Slam when they are playing a deciding tie-break and the crowd are going crazy, but you get more of that with UTS. Almost in every match.

“We wanted a different type of experience for fans watching UTS, a stronger experience. Traditional tennis will always be there in the sport, but this can be something different.”

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Traditionalists may shy away from a remodelled version of tennis that only allows players one serve per point in a match divided up into four eight-minute quarters.

Yet a glance at the audience in New York and especially at last year’s UTS Grand Final in London confirmed young audiences lap up a version of the sport that offers a very different experience to a day watching tennis in a Grand Slam event or a regular ATP Tour tournament.

“This is not about competing with the Grand Slams, that was never our goal,” insisted Mouratoglou.

“The Grand Slams are history, they are the big events in tennis every year. They have something we will never have, but we have something different to them.

“What we proposed with UTS was a completely different experience for tennis and to involve the younger generation.

“If your son or daughter goes home and says it was better than classical tennis, that’s exactly what we want. It reaches out to a different audience.

“A lot of tennis fans can love UTS, but the more traditional and conservative fans are the ones that are going to be the most difficult to convert.

“What we can do is attract a new audience, maybe a younger audience, and that is what we have seen with UTS crowds.

“We a really targeting fans who are under 40 and when they experience UTS for the first time, they really love it. They don’t follow tennis all year long, but we want to get them interested in our sport and if they like UTS, then they will hopefully like tennis as well.

“One issue is the tennis calendar is so intense. Finding the best weeks for UTS is tough because you want to have the best players, but you also need to find a week that can work for them.

“We had UTS New York the week before the US Open and that was great because all the players are there, but it is hard to exist next to a Grand Slam as that will get all the attention.”

The 2025 UTS season will get underway in Guadalajara, Mexico and Mouratoglous confirms he is looking to add more dates and locations to the schedule.

“There are a couple of great events coming up in the final months of 2024 and the UTS Grand Final in London should be amazing,” added Mouratoglou.

“Looking back to last December, we had incredible crowds in London last year and now we are in a bigger venue, tickets are already selling so well and it will be an amazing end to the UTS year.

“We are looking at the cities for next year. We like to go to cities that don’t always have a lot of tennis and that is something we are looking at for 2025.”

WHAT IS UTS?

– Fast-paced and intense matches composed of 4 quarters of 8 minutes each
– Live coaching allowed and live-streamed to the fans
– Mid-match interviews to get inside of the players’ minds
– An emphasis on strategy with the introduction of UTS cards that allow players to win three points at once
– Suspense until the last second with decisive points and sudden deaths
– A diluted code of conduct that encourages players to let off steam during matches