Beginning with the 2019 Australian Open, the number of seeded players at majors will be cut in half to 16, the first time it will be at that number in eighteen years. The expected result is for more competitive tennis at the beginning of tournaments. But, from a historical perspective, will this really be the case? That is, after reverting to a draw of 16 seeds, will there be more upsets in the opening rounds?
A follow-up analysis of tennis majors that takes a deeper look at the ebbs and flows of these matches. Do matches vary in competitiveness on a consistent basis? Is there evidence that the later sets of a match are more dominated by the eventual winner? Also, as a match progresses, is there any way to predict who has the advantage in winning the match?
For more than 100 years, men have played best-of-five sets at the four professional tennis majors. There has been, however, much debate on social media and elsewhere about the merits of moving to a best-of-three format. But, for an issue that generates passionate opinions, it is rare to see actual statistics cited. This is an analysis of the scoreline of every match at a major from 2000 through 2016. The data is cross-referenced by year, venue, in which round the match occurred as well as its duration.