{"id":97112,"date":"2026-02-01T15:19:26","date_gmt":"2026-02-01T20:19:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/?p=97112"},"modified":"2026-02-01T15:19:26","modified_gmt":"2026-02-01T20:19:26","slug":"australia-open-boss-best-of-five-sets-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/2026\/02\/01\/australia-open-boss-best-of-five-sets-women\/","title":{"rendered":"Australian Open Boss Pushes for Best-Of-Five Sets for Women"},"content":{"rendered":"

Now that the dust is settling after what has been an intriguing Australian Open, where Carlos Alcaraz and Elena Rybakina emerged victorious, the discussion will inevitably turn to what we learnt and how the rest of the season is expected to play out. However, Craig Tiley – CEO of Tennis Australia – has his sights set on a different direction.<\/p>\n

The CEO of Tennis Australia, who also serves as the director of the Australian Open, is looking to make the women’s Grand Slam events a best-of-five-sets affair. He stated this after the women’s final, in which Rybakina emerged victorious over Sabalenka, and referenced the blockbuster semifinals on the men’s side as a reason to make the switch.<\/p>\n

Speaking to AAP on the subject, he said<\/u><\/a><\/span>, \u201cYou can\u2019t replicate that (men\u2019s) semifinal day. That was amazing,\u201d going on to add, \u201cI\u2019m still like getting chills just thinking about it.” He’s not wrong, though, as anyone who watched either or both of the semifinals on the men’s side knows it was filled with quality tennis, unexpected twists, and remarkable comebacks that could not have been scripted any better. It was a day full of plot twists that even Shakespeare would have been envious of. And it is exactly that which Tiley is looking to recreate on the women’s side.<\/p>\n

There would likely be dissenting voices and whether the women’s game needs to make the switch – particularly as the intensity of the tennis schedule is under the spotlight. Tiley\u00a0acknowledges that, as he is only looking to implement the change in the latter stages of the tournament, probably starting from the quarter-finals through to the finals. He also knows that moves in that direction will require the players’ blessing. This has not stopped him from believing in the mission or that the changes can be implemented as early as next year’s Australian Open.<\/p>\n

Whether this will materialise is anyone’s guess. Still, it certainly won’t be for the want of trying, as Tennis Australia has consistently been the most progressive of the four Slam organisers. History has shown they have not been shy about altering the tennis landscape, both on the court and in how the sport is experienced.<\/p>\n

In 2019, they were the first slam to implement the 10-point tiebreak, the first to introduce electronic line calling and more recently, on-court coaching pods were introduced in 2025\u00a0 following the rule change<\/u><\/a><\/span> to allow coaching during matches and the LED net posts were introduced during this year’s event, which has also proven to be a nice little addition.\u00a0In the coming months, behind-the-scenes conversations and dialogues will take place with all the relevant stakeholders. One suspects that the ultimate decision will rest on how the players feel about it.<\/p>\n

It might be surprising to most if, come 2027, we have the first-ever five-set matches in women’s tennis in the Open Era, but what will not surprise anyone is if this happens at the Australian Open, which, despite being the youngest of the Grand Slams, will once again be proving to be the most adventurous and daring of them all.<\/p>\n

Main photo credit: Mike Frey-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Now that the dust is settling after what has been an intriguing Australian Open, where Carlos Alcaraz and Elena Rybakina emerged victorious, the discussion will inevitably turn to what we learnt and how the rest of the season is expected to play out. However, Craig Tiley – CEO of Tennis Australia – has his sights […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5743,"featured_media":97147,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,7],"tags":[9870],"class_list":["post-97112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wta","category-australian-open","tag-craig-tiley"],"modified_by":"Jim Smith","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5743"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97112"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97112\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":97148,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97112\/revisions\/97148"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/97147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}