Tennis journey and innovation
The writer, Aaro Pöllänen, is the Head of Sales at Zenniz. Aaro shares his tennis journey in a nutshell, highlighting technological possibilities within club level and competitions.
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I have spent a large portion of my life inside tennis clubs: competing, training, and watching.
At the age of 9, it started with local tournaments in Finland, then Tennis Europe events, then the ITF juniors circuit, and Futures pro tournaments. Eventually, I ended up playing D1 college tennis in the U.S. Along the way, I’ve spent time in hundreds of tennis clubs across the world.
Each club is different. Some have a deep sense of tradition, others are more forward-looking. Some are built around high-performance player development, while others focus on creating a strong local community. What they all share is that they’re central to how people experience tennis.
I have also watched the rise of tennis technology.
As with any sports technology, there’s often a honeymoon phase when something new arrives, and the usage tends to drop after that period. But the tools that matter are the ones that create daily value for all stakeholders of the sport.
Most importantly, whether the players are high-performance juniors or recreational weekend warriors. What does the daily value mean? Comprehensiveness. There should be lots of use cases for different types of clubs, and players of all levels. Some care about watching the session on video afterwards, some love to dive into their analytics and stats, and some just love observing their shot speeds and having fun with gamified on-court drills.
Back when I was grinding through matches on the junior circuit, we didn’t have much beyond a scorecard and a coach’s notebook. Video analysis was rare, match stats were done by hand, and player development was based mainly on memory and feel. That approach has its upsides, but looking back, I see how much untapped potential there was when it comes to additional tools, such as video and analytics.
One of the recent hot topics in the tennis world has been electronic line calling. We are now closer than ever to having ELC available at club level. Until now, it’s only been available at ATP/WTA level tournaments. Looking back when I still played ITF junior tournaments or college tennis, I understand why there is so much buzz around having ELC. I’m sure anyone who has played ITF tournaments, Tennis Europe tournaments, college tennis, or similar competitions knows how much focus and effort goes into line calling. The human mind works in a way that the mistakes and disputes are the ones that stand out. The tennis world has been urging for an unbiased, accurate, and scalable solution to tackle this.
Tennis as a sport has a long history and traditions, which is why any innovation needs to be carefully considered. I do believe that it’s just a matter of time before technology becomes part of the daily experience at all types of clubs and competitions - not just the ATP and WTA venues, but local clubs globally.