Serena Williams won't play in Singapore leg of IPTL
Tennis fans looking forward to watching the star power of the fast-paced International Premier Tennis League (IPTL) will be disappointed to know that Serena Williams and Roger Federer have pulled out of the event.
Williams, the 22-time Grand Slam winner and former world number 1 cut short her 2016 season after crashing out of the US Open semi-finals in September. She pulled out of the WTA Finals in October citing a shoulder injury. According to the IPTL schedule on its website, she was originally slated to play on Tuesday and Wednesday this week in the Singapore Indoor Stadium for the Singapore Slammers team.
The Singapore leg will be played from 6 to 8 Dec.
Federer, who has won 17 Grand Slam titles in his career, already had an abbreviated 2016 season after suffering a knee injury. He ended his season on 26 July, missing the Rio Olympics and US Open. He was slated to play only in the India leg of the tournament in Hyderabad.
Federer made a brief appearance in Singapore at last year’s edition, playing only on the first day of the three-day tournament. Current world number two Novak Djokovic, who was slated to play in Singapore for the IPTL last year and this year has not played in the year-end exhibition tournament since playing for the first edition in 2014.
The IPTL format features mixed teams playing faster-paced and shorter tennis matches to score points for their team.
Since its debut two years ago, this year’s IPTL has significantly less star power, and the 2016 tour has been reduced from five countries to three. The first edition in 2014 featured the likes of well-known players such as Maria Sharapova, Andy Murray, Andre Agassi and Michael Chang.
Mahesh Bhupathi, founder and Managing Director of IPTL said, “We have had challenges this year, and we were hoping to get past them. With the current economic climate in India and the uncertainty of spending money, I reached out to both Roger and Serena to explain the situation. They have been both been very supportive of the IPTL the first two seasons and we look forward to bring them in future years.”
