"It probably should have happened a long time ago": Novak Djokovic admits potential ATP-WTA merger makes commercial sense

World number one Serbia’s legendary tennis star Novak Djokovic has backed the idea of the merger between WTA and ATP as according to him, it will make more sense commercially.

There have been reports emerging from the tennis world that a WTA and ATP tours merger is on the cards in the near future. Djokovic, who is currently taking part in the Australian Open, was quoted in a report where he backed the idea but also stated that he has no insider information about the developments.

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“Yeah, I heard. I’m not sure if it’s like a total merge or is it only a commercial kind of collaboration or agreement between the two tours? I think to some extent it’s logical,” he said. “I mean, that if we are having so many combined events on the tour that, you know, we try to collaborate even further together and increase the value, I guess, of tennis overall.

“But, you know, when it comes to the total merge, I’m not so sure if that can work, to be honest, because a lot of things, there is still a lot of differences, you know, with the rules and the way that the tours operate. But commercially, yeah, I mean, why not? Let’s see what happens. I’m not in the council anymore, so I don’t have any inside information to share with you, but let’s see what happens.”

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Djokovic is often regarded as the greatest player in the history of tennis in the men’s singles category in the Open era, having won as many as 24 Grand Slam titles. He is now just two matches away from winning his 25th major title after cementing his place in the semifinal of the first Grand Slam of the year after beating America’s Taylor Fritz in the last-eight clash with a score of 7-6, 4-6, 6-2, 6-3.