The 2022 WTA Finals tournament are being played at the Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas. That means the best-of-best tournament of the season returns to the US after 17 years. So, since last time the tournament was played,applied-technologyin professional tennis has changed a lot.
For the tournament, the firsteight-ranked women playersin the Women’s Tennis Association will play in a round-robin tournament to qualify for a semifinals, then to the finals. Thisnew tournament system meet the needs to make more attractive thistype of tournaments. In fact, that isn’t the only thing new in the final tournament of the season.
The innovationmade by the USTA goes beyond and impacts the referee’s job. Which includes line judges, who are responsible for making the decision in tough spots. Those men and women aren’ton the sidelines anymore because the USTA decided to opt for a newsystembased on applied-technologies.
Whythere are notline judges in theWTAFinals tournament sidelines?
Tennis tournaments held in U.S. soilhavealways been the front-runners for new applied-technologiesin professionaltennis. In fact, in 2006, the US Opentournament was the first Grand Slam to use the electronic line calling system. However, at the time, they kept the line judges on the court, in order to help the chair umpire.
But since the 2020 pandemic stroke out, the USTA decided to take out line judgesfrom the tennis tournaments held in the US. In fact, both ATP and WTA tournaments usethe electronic-line calling system and the Hawkeye technologyin their tournaments when there are played in the United States.
So, it may seem off to watch a tennis game without line judges, but it’s a simple change thathas multiple benefits. For example, theelectronic-linecalling system is based on the actual facts, not what somebody could have seen at the moment. In fact, takes off the pressure for a line judge, especially in a tournament with such relevance such as the 2022 WTA Finals.