Ball change in tennis: How does it affect match characteristics and rally pace in Grand Slam tournaments?

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F00216208%3A11510%2F20%3A10400383" target="_blank" >RIV/00216208:11510/20:10400383 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://verso.is.cuni.cz/pub/verso.fpl?fname=obd_publikace_handle&handle=9Rwv1G.O.N" target="_blank" >https://verso.is.cuni.cz/pub/verso.fpl?fname=obd_publikace_handle&handle=9Rwv1G.O.N</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.14198/jhse.2020.151.14" target="_blank" >10.14198/jhse.2020.151.14</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Ball change in tennis: How does it affect match characteristics and rally pace in Grand Slam tournaments?

Original language description

Tennis balls degrade after fast racket and ground impacts until they are changed after agreed number of games. The aim is to analyse the new (after the ball change) and used balls (prior to the ball change) match characteristics and the frequency of rally shots in matches in the Australian Open, French Open and Wimbledon in 2017. Paired samples t-tests and Cohen d were used to compare the point duration, number of rally shots, time between the points, rally pace and work to rest ratio among these tournaments. There was a significant difference in rally shots number played with the new balls (4.17 +- 0.86) compared to the used balls (4.60 +- 1.10) in female matches (p = 0.047); in males matches large effect size was found (d = - 0.83) in the same variable with the new balls (4.44 +- 0.57) and used balls (4.95 +- 0.66), both happened in the Australian Open. No difference was found between the new and used balls in the rally pace in all the observed events. The Wimbledon match characteristics were least affected by the ball change. The ball degradation affected the match characteristic the most in the Australian Open, in terms of more rally shots, but not slowing down the rally pace. Our findings inform us how the ball change can affect the game performance in professional tennis.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_imp - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

30306 - Sport and fitness sciences

Project

—

Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2020

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Journal of Human Sport and Exercise [online]

ISSN

1988-5202

e-ISSN

—

Volume of the periodical

15

Issue of the periodical within the volume

1

Country of publishing house

ES - SPAIN

Number of pages

10

Pages from-to

153-162

UT code for WoS article

000518421000014

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85104867205