Rafael Nadal leads the ATP Tour in second-serve points won.
Nadal believes tennis should take a second look at reforms to diminish the serve from dominating the sport.
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Asked to name one rule change he would make to improve the sport, Nadal said longer rallies create more drama and excitement for fans.
“My feeling is we need to move the sport the way that the people want it, and I don't know which is that way,” Nadal told the media after his straight-sets sweep of Guido Pella. “But the most important thing for our sport is to change our sport to the way that is more attractive for the people, for the fans. That's my feeling.”
The 14-time Grand Slam champion suggest the size and power of today’s players threatens to reduce rallies and create serving contests rather than dramatic encounters.
“It's obvious that every time people are taller, every time people have more power, serve is going faster, points are shorter, I'm not sure if that's the way that we need to move our sport,” Nadal said. “So we need to find a way to manage, keep having a good show and keep having emotions. And people gets emotional when the matches are becoming more dramatic, and people don't remember a lot of matches just with serves and aces.
"People remember matches with long points, rallies. And for sure you can have aces, and that's part of the sport and it's nice, the ace and the good serves, too, no? But cannot be that easy.”
The King of Clay conceded he’s sometimes reluctant to discuss rule changes because some will say he’s advocating changes that serve his own self-interest.
“When I am talking about (rule changes) people can think it's because that helps me,” Nadal said. “But I am talking here about the sport overall, no? No, no, not about my generation, because with these conditions I had lot of success. If you ask me, I don't want changes. I am very happy with this format, because I am having a lot of success with this format, no?
“But is true that looking forward, you know, looking five, ten years in front, you see every time the people is taller. Every time people have the chance to serve faster, and if we want to maintain, I think, good points, if we want to maintain a good show for the people, it's something we need to do, no? We need to start from the younger generations. So you need to put at that line and say in seven years that's gonna change. We cannot change things like this.”
The two-time Olympic gold medal champion suggested raising the height of the net is a possible solution.
“I am no one to say which change gonna be good. Just looking a little bit around, you see that tennis will need changes, you know,” Nadal said. “The net is still at the same altitude. People are not the same. People are much more taller now than 50 years ago. So it's obvious that we're gonna need some changes in not a very long period of time.”
Photo credit: Guillermo Sanchez