“Talk about it!”

London Calling – Day 7 Diary

In the final London Calling diary, we chat to Managing Director, Chris Kermode, about the success of the inaugural Barclays ATP World Tour Finals.

What has been the most pleasing aspect of the event for you?

I think the most pleasing aspect of the tournament is that we started this two, three years ago and everyone kept telling us that it wouldn’t work at this time of the year and that tennis interest in this country was just based on Queen’s and Wimbledon. I think we demonstrated quite clearly that there was a huge demand for top-level tennis in this country.

What has feedback been like from players and fans?

I’ve had quite a few players say that it’s the best-staged tennis event they’ve ever seen. I think everyone’s blown away by The O2 arena and I think just the presentation of the event and the fact that, even in doubles, it’s been played in front of 17,500 people.

The court looks so good, with the lighting looking like it’s a boxing ring. The fans that I’ve spoken to have all said it’s one of the best entertainment evenings they’ve had, as opposed to just a sporting evening.

How have the players enjoyed travelling by boat to The O2?

Everyone kept telling me that players will not travel on boats, they’re used to the cars. I think the boats have been a huge success. I’ve gone on the boats with all the players this week and they all look totally relaxed on it. I think they didn’t really understand that it was a river, and not the sea! I think they had thoughts of bobbing about all over the place! It’s very calm and also you know that it takes 30 minutes from the hotel to the arena, as opposed to the traffic that is so unpredictable in London.

What has kept you awake at night?

I think two things.

Firstly, just staging an event for the first time, you just hope the show production works smoothly and you hope that the lighting does work from when you’ve started drawing it on a piece of paper to actually seeing it built.

There was also the big risk we took with two sessions. Again, most people just wanted the one session; it takes the risk factor out if there’s either a match that is over with very quickly or someone injures themselves. So, I was just hoping that we didn’t have a withdrawal in the middle of a match after 10 minutes.

What has been the most unusual player request you’ve had this week?

I tell you what, they’ve all been so relaxed here. I actually have had more bizarre requests at Queen’s than I’ve had here. It just went so smoothly. Players appreciated the hotel and the boats and how they were all looked after. The backstage bar area, overlooking the court, in their player lounge worked really well.

Did the players enjoy getting close to the fans on the public practice court?

I think that’s been one of the most successful parts of this event. At indoor tennis arenas around the world normally you only experience the tennis when you go into the actual bowl with your physical ticket. What we tried to do was engage a new audience. At any given time in this arena, there’s probably 5,000 people here, who aren’t here for the event that’s on. So they’re at the restaurant and at the cinema or the nightclubs.

I watched Nadal practise in front of probably about 2,000 people who, quite clearly, had never ever seen live tennis before. You could hear the enthusiasm and engage them into watching the game.

What’s been your personal highlight from the tennis this week?

For me, I’ve just been amazed at seeing Nikolay Davydenko close up and just seeing the quality of the tennis he played this week, which was breathtaking. To see his footwork and balance, I mean the guy did not stop running and retrieving. I think the highlight for me was him playing late on Friday night, then having to come back on the Saturday lunchtime and he beat the World No. 1!

What improvements or changes would you like to implement next year?

It’s year one, we’re here for five years. We will review the event and we will always look to improve it year on year. We sold 260,000 seats out of 265,000 over 15 sessions, which makes it the biggest indoor tennis event ever. It’s the third most highly attended sporting event in this country, behind Wimbledon over two weeks and the British Grand Prix. But we will always look to make the player and fan experience better year on year.