Preach, sister! Martina and Johnny Mac have been talking about this for years. I agree with your reasoning, and will add that replaying these points makes the match too long, too slow. Casual tennis viewers I know are really bothered by this, which doesn’t help attracting new fans.
I honestly think they could drop it tomorrow and no one would miss it. I respectfully disagree with
@Kieran that it creates tension. I agree with you that it's more of a pointless drag. Plus, you play lets during the point, and sometimes funny bounces off the net make for some interesting points. Should keep players on their toes.
Absolutely. There’s beginning to be this unstated rule that if they have a roof, they have to use it. They’re no longer the stadium equivalents of umbrellas, which I thought was the whole idea.
EDIT: I responded to this before reading the reply by
@Kieran who also used the umbrella analogy.
I feel like the tournaments spent so much effort figuring out how to get funding for their expensive roofs, and almost no time at all considering what rules they would apply to using them.
@Margaret was asking if there were consistent rules about using them, the other day. While they don't all have to be consistent, IMO, they could do with some conferring with each other, the Majors, as to what makes some sense. For example, the AO does have a heat rule, and that makes sense in the AO summer. The USOpen does NOT have one, yet they seemed to close the roof on Sunday just for the sake of comfort. I would like to see some rules laid out, and made transparent. I'd also like to know how long it takes to close each roof + acclimatize the environment, i.e., what is the stoppage time?
The umbrella analogy was mine, (which is how I shoe-horned The Umbrellas of Cherbourg into a tennis thread. LOL.) I do like it, though...rain cover, when needed. As I said, I know you can't just open it and close it with every rain break, but there has to be respect for the fact that you're an outdoor tournament, just with options, in extremis. Kieran brought up the sore subject of the Wimbledon 2018 SF. At the time, Wimbledon had this bizarre notion that the environment created at the beginning of the match might be maintained for the rest of it. Then they left it to the players. If one preferred the same environment, they were going to go with that. Well, of course, Novak chose to keep the roof closed on the very sunny Day 2. (Not saying that's why he won, but it advantaged him and he knew it. And it went to 10-8 in the 5th.) Later, even Wimbledon acknowledged that that was a ridiculous way to decide roof open/closed and changed the rule. But, seriously....if they'd ever thought about it harder, they'd have realized it should be a tournament decision, not something left to the players.
Some questions, some requests:
* In a situation of no rain, how bad does a forecast have to be to close the roof, preventatively? And (again) how much of a disruption of play is it to close the roof when rain arrives? (I think Centre Court Wimbledon is 30 minutes.)
* Just because the previous match had the roof closed, what decides that the roof shouldn't be re-opened for the next one?
* In the case of a rainy start, why not open the roof when the weather has cleared, particularly if there is a lot of the match to be played? Is it an absolute that once the roof is closed, it cannot be opened? If so, why?
* If the match carries over to a second day, what is the rule?
* What is the heat rule vis-a-vis the roof...especially if the USOpen decides to change it.
In the case of Wimbledon, they need the roof for lights...is that still true? I think at the French Open it's not. At AO and USO, obviously not. But again, who decides, and when?