Dresden. It is the greatest success in the club’s history. The TC Blau-Weiß Blasewitz won bronze in the first women’s tennis league. How important or rather unimportant that actually is within the German Tennis Association (DTB) becomes apparent when you know that the Dresden women don’t even get bronze medals for it. “The champion receives a trophy, otherwise there is nothing,” says team manager Sven Grosse.
Blasewitz gambled away the runner-up behind the new champion TC Bredeney with a 4-5 defeat against Stuttgart on Saturday. There is also no silver for the Aachen women, who also moved up second place.
On the last day of the match, Blasewitz had to explain to a large part of the 300 visitors in the forest park why the one player that the largest East German tennis club advertises so aggressively is not there after all: the German star Andrea Petkovic.
It’s pretty easy to explain. The former world number ninth played her way into the semifinals at the Belgrade Open at the same time, but failed because of the Dutch Arantxa Rus. Her club colleague Kristyna Pliskova was thrown out in Belgrade in the quarter-finals and made her way to Dresden in a hurry. The 29-year-old only arrived in the forest park via Prague on Saturday morning.
Andrea Petkovic played in Belgrade on Friday and traveled on to Cluj in Romania. She will play there from Monday. © dpa
“The line-up of the team on matchday is always associated with luck,” says Sven Grosse, reminiscent of the second day of the home game, on which he announced the appearance of the audience’s favorite. “She made it to the semi-finals in Hamburg, where she is basically playing the best tournament in a long time. Then she’s not here. That’s just the way it is,” said Grosse. In other words, the professionals earn the majority of their annual salary at the tournaments, the Bundesliga is at best a nice extra income for the players in the top 100 in the world rankings, which in the best case is also fun. “We still had a good team in terms of team spirit,” says the team manager. The Bundesliga is embedded in the middle of the international tournament calendar – and from a sporting point of view that is a curse.
There are also unforeseen events. The nominal number one of the bubble whores, the Romanian Patricia Maria Tig, has disappeared from the scene for months. “She won’t play a tournament for the next six months, as far as I know it’s not a sports injury, it’s an illness,” explains Grosse. The Dresden women also had to accept a positively explainable failure. The Czech Tereza Martincova, nominally only number four in Blasewitz, is playing such an outstanding tournament season that she is currently up to 65th in the world rankings. As high as no other player from the forest park. “She has fully focused on her tournaments and wants to get as far as possible. You have to understand that.”
Petkovic should also play for Dresden next season
Grosse expects Andrea Petkovic to continue – for the next season. “She has announced that she will still play next year. And we will now talk about what we can do better for 2022.” The contract with the 33-year-old provided for a home game day in the forest park. “We have firmly agreed this home game, that’s right. If there is a reason, like now, then we are simply unlucky. The contract will just not be lived. We are now talking about the 2022 season after the season,” assures the team manager. who works full-time as a lawyer.
“The bottom line is: With what we have in terms of potential, we played a huge season with great new players,” said Sven Grosse. There is still no concrete concept for how the women’s tennis Bundesliga can be positioned more valuable within the DTB. A live stream will probably be made mandatory in the coming season, a title sponsor might increase the financial know-how and the weighting of the top division. We’ll let the season sink in and see what can be changed, “said Grosse in talks with the competing clubs.
Blasewitz wants to continue to establish the Bundesliga despite immense financial efforts. A budget of between 50,000 and 80,000 euros can be assumed, the makers behind the scenes cannot elicit exact figures. “I assume that we will see the tennis Bundesliga again in the Waldpark in 2022,” says Grosse.
