NEW YORK — Imagine if fans at a Major League Baseball game were told they needed to wait until the end of an inning to go grab a beer and a hot dog. Or if folks at an NFL or NBA game weren’t supposed to head to the restroom until after a quarter finished. Would never happen, right?
That, though, is essentially what etiquette long has demanded at tennis matches, particularly at Grand Slam tournaments such as the US Open, which started Monday: No one gets in or out during a game. Indeed, not even between games, sometimes. At the start of a set, for example, everyone has been required to hang on until the first changeover, which arrives after three games.
Not anymore at Flushing Meadows. Under a new policy instituted this year, people with tickets for certain sections at every court — from 23,859-capacity Arthur Ashe Stadium all the way down to 336-seat Courts No. 8 and 16 — can move around whenever they want, even during play. And there’s no more twiddling thumbs as multiple games go by before entering or exiting; that’s now permitted after every game.
Spectators seemed to love it on Day 1; might take some players a bit to get used to this, which also was tried at the Australian Open in January.
“I noticed it, but once the point starts, I don’t notice it. I guess with college tennis I’ve played … there’s a lot of situations where I’ve been in that’s a lot crazier than a couple of people walking with drinks back to their seat — Honey Deuces,” said 2023 U.S. Open semifinalist Ben Shelton, referring to the signature cocktail the tournament peddles for $23 a pop.
“I don’t really mind it,” added Shelton, the 2022 NCAA champion for Florida and a winner in Ashe on Monday. “I’m sure some players will be annoyed with it this week.”
Most players asked Monday, including defending champion Coco Gauff, echoed Olympic silver medalist Donna Vekic‘s take: “Doesn’t really bother me that much.”
There are, after all, distractions aplenty at the noisiest Slam, from rowdy late-night crowds to airplanes zooming overhead to the clatter of nearby trains.
U.S. Open tournament referee Jake Garner acknowledged this could “take some getting used to, from the players’ point of view,”…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at www.espn.com – TENNIS…