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Karnataka has become the hub of Indian tennis over the last few years, having hosted several events across the state. KSLTA recently hosted the Bengaluru Open 2024, which saw players from all over the world compete for the ATP Challenger title.
Sportskeeda caught up with Sunil Yajaman, the esteemed Tournament Director of the Bengaluru Open, as he shared support received from ATP, the importance of ATP events for the growth of Indian players, and the role of sponsors in promoting the tournaments and making it big.
Q: What support does ATP provide for hosting events?
Sunil Yajaman: ATP has a financial grant that they give for all tournaments from their sponsorship and I think that covers some part of the prize money. We've been lucky because of the way we have been conducting and organizing this event, the Bengaluru Open last year; we had done our TV production, and we had telecast on the TV channel.
This year, ATP rewarded us, saying that we had been chosen for broadcasting from their side. ATP sent a team during the TV production, and we are telecasting it on Eurosport.
Q: Can you add up the role of sponsors also in this?
Sunil Yajaman: When you have the money, you can do anything. The money coming in is only through sponsorships, and we've been lucky. We have had quite a few sponsors who've been with us for the last six years who've been supporting every edition of ours. So it's like the corporates of Bangalore, the business houses of Bangalore are coming forward and supporting this event, and most of them have been there for a long time.
We've had two or three who have come on the news this year, and I'm sure they will continue staying with us for a long time. We have Dafa News, who signed a three-year contract with us. This is the second year, and we have one more year to go.
I'm sure all these sponsors would see the value added for their brand being present here at the Bengaluru Open with the TV telecast with a good turnout of crowd and some amazing support.
I have to thank the government of Karnataka because they have been supportive every year. They've always been very supportive. The tournament was funded and supported by the government of Karnataka for the first few years. I think that made it a permanent event and the prime image of the Bengaluru Open grew so that a lot of other sponsors came in.
Q: Can you shed some light on how these tournaments are so important for Indian tennis to grow?
Sunil Yajaman: In my opinion, this is all that the players need. I think even more than supporting financially if we can get 25-30 weeks of features for men and 20-25 weeks of features for women and have about eight to ten challengers. That's at least about eight weeks for men and four or five weeks for women.
I think you don't even need to do anything more because all the players need is the opportunity and the platform where they can come and play the tournament and pick up those points.
With all these players playing within India, I'm sure there will be quite a few players who can make it to the big stage. We should be able to bring at least about eight to ten players to the top 200, from which about four or five players will move to the top hundred, from which another one or two will move up to the top 30 or 40 in the world.
Q: How are ATP events helping the Indian players?
Sunil Yajaman: Ramkumar Ramanathan started his first professional title here in Bengaluru in 2017 and that gave him the boost that's required by winning the Challenger in the same year.
Every year, quite a few players get to play in ATP events. Last week in Chennai, Prajwal qualified for the ATP Challenger Chennai. This year, again, Ramkumar, who's coming back, and hasn't played much of singles in the last two years used this opportunity well. These tournaments (ATP) have been extremely important for the players.
