New Tennis Canada Tournament Policy for Juniors

As 2015 begins, a new tournament policy was put into effect for juniors players only. Tennis Canada has added "Late Withdrawals and Failure to Complete Required Tournament Events" to the "Rules of the Court." According to their release, this will:
1) Help protect the integrity of the event and associated rankings.
2) Protect players who are affected by the player not showing up or withdrawing from the tournament.
3) Help create and teach each player the responsibility and the importance of following through on commitments.

Effective January 1st, 2015:
Players withdrawing after the draws have been posted or failing to show up for their scheduled match will receive one "LW/FC" penalty point regardless of the reason (doctor's note not required). This includes tournaments with double elimination (e.g. Nationals) where a player plays in the main draw and then withdraws or does not show up for the consolation match. However, only one "LW/FC" penalty point will be assessed to the player per event (main draw and consolation draw and/or doubles draw).

Once a player receives three "LW/FC" penalty points within a span of 12 months, a suspension for three months will occur. A suspension is not being able to compete in any Canadian event (National, Provincial, ITF domestic). This suspension period begins the day after the completion of the event from which the third penalty point took place. Players may appeal to their PTA regarding their suspension.

NEW 2015: Late Withdrawal and Failure to Complete Required Tournament Events (This is separate from the code of conduct.)
a) Withdrawal after the draw has been posted – 1.0 LW/FC Penalty Point
b) Failure to compete all required events at a tournament – 1.0 LW/FC Penalty Point

New Rogers Junior Rankings

Rogers Rankings  |  After five years the head-to-head ranking system has been dropped. A new national junior ranking system has replaced the previous system at the start of this year. The head-to-head system had so many benefits, such as points can be gained (or lost) in the consolation draws. It was touted as a superior system that can take in any other form of competition and compute the ranking points. For example, ranking points can be awarded for league play or even club closed tournaments since it was not based on the progression through the rounds in the draw. It was hyped as being able to include most matches not deemed possible before.

Not everything was favourable. Points stayed with the players from the moment their ranking points were computed. Getting the initial ranking points was crucial. Without big points earned in the initial ranking, the progression through the ranking ladder was somewhat limited for the majority of the junior players. Gaining points there after was rather a difficult process as a player would also lose points for losing matches.

So what led to the downfall? The explanation was top players were protecting their ranking points. A loss would mean points deduction. A bad loss would mean bigger points deduction. Once a top ranking is obtain there is no need to participate in more than the selected tournaments required for National selection. That is not to say these top junior played only these selected tournaments. Most often they would travel outside the country and get their competition elsewhere without jeopardizing their selection to the Canadian Nationals.

The current new ranking system is actually an improved version of the previous ranking system before the head-to-head ranking system was implemented in 2009. This improved version has a better points awardation for each round won, points can be combined from different junior age categories, it is based on a rolling 52 weeks point accumulation, points awarded are based on the strength of the tournament, and each provincial ranking as well as a national ranking can be computed from these points.

To read a more detailed write-up, please go to the "Tournaments" tab above. The tournament winners list of the past ten years of the Coquitlam Junior Open Championships and Coquitlam Junior are now updated. The winners beyond 2005 will be updated in the near future.

2009 New Tournament Ranking System

Rogers Rankings | The last time the tennis ranking system in BC changed was at the beginning of 2008. The ranking system prior to 2008 was around for a long time and was based solely on the accumulation of points during the year. Points were earned according to how far you progressed in the draw. This model rewarded quantity of events played over quality of results achieved. This obviously favoured anyone who kept playing tournaments after tournaments. The drawback was someone can be ranked in the top 10 of their category without being capable of beating the other top 10 players. So on January 1 of 2008, the ranking system was changed to reflect the relative merit of all players in the system. After getting feedback from players and tournament directors, the ranking was more closely tied to the player's usual tournament performance and weighted for participation. The rating was then based on the player's average points per tournament multiplied by a participation factor. This was not a major change, but it did strengthen the accuracy of the rankings to a certain degree. By the end of 2008, it appeared that this change was only an interim measure because a completely different ranking system was already underway and would be introduced on January 1 of 2009. Every match data in 2008 were input in the computer so that an initial ranking list can be achieved by January 1 of this year. So what is it?

This new and enhanced ranking system known as the Rogers Rankings is based on the proven Chess Elo ranking system. The Elo system was invented by Arpad Elo, a master-level chess player, and was implemented in 1960 by the United States Chess Federation as an improved chess rating system. Today it is also used in many other games. The primary goal of Elo ratings is to accurately predict the game results between the competitors. This new Rogers Rankings system will award points to players based on quality of wins, which are the head-to-head results, rather than rounds won in a tournament, as in the previous tennis ranking systems. Thus in a head-to-head match up, the stronger (or higher ranked) player is expected to win, while the weaker (or lower ranked) player is expected to lose. And over time, the system generates accurate rankings due to its ability to evaluate the calibre of the competing players. In this case, every sanctioned match that a player plays, be it at the international, national, provincial or at the local level, points will be used to compute one common national ranking, irrespective of age, and can be sub-filtered into provincial rankings, over 35 rankings, under 18 ranking and so on. Sanctioned league and club matches may one day be included in this ranking system.

Rogers Rankings have been fully tested for a year, and the data that have been fed into the common database, the BASELINE management system, in 2008 will provide the initial ranking to determined the point values for matches since the beginning of this year. At present, only the juniors (U12 to U18) and the adults (3.0 to 5.5 and open) singles rankings will be Elo ranked. Senior head-to-head ranking may be added in 2010, and doubles may also be ranked this way in future. In order for a new player to enter the system, the player must accumulate at least one win and two losses against players who are already ranked over the course of 12 months. This will give the player a temporary ranking for which an initial ranking can be obtain. Results against players who do not have an initial ranking will be counted later once the unranked player becomes ranked. Each time the BASELINE ranking system is updated, it will automatically checks for new players inclusion into the rankings and adjust all the points against these new players retroactively. So for some players, new ranking points will be added or subtracted even when no match has been played during this time.

To further enhance the head-to-head points value, a star value system will highlight the importance of certain tournaments or events. The higher the star value, the higher the point gains or losses. National tournaments have a 5 star value, while at provincial level, a 4 to 1 star value is awarded. At the local level, a 2 or 1 star value is assigned.

The table below shows the various point values under the star value system. An example, male player A has 3800 points and male player B has 3500 points. The points spread between these two players is 300. Finding this 300 point difference is in the row 300–399 which gives a +/– 4 and a +/– 78 under the 5-star column. If the higher ranked player A wins, under the "higher" column, he will receive only 4 points to add to his 3800 ranking points, and the lower ranked player B will lose 4 points from his 3500 ranking points. So the new ranking points for A will be 3804 (3800 + 4) and player B will get 3496 (3500 – 4). If the lower ranked player B wins the match, he will get 78 points added to his previous total of 3500, while the higher ranked player A will lose 78 point from his existing ranking. So player A will be ranked with 3722 points (3800 – 78), and player B will improve his ranking point to 3578 (3500 + 78).

Default match will automatically result in a lost of 20 points, and a gain of 20 points for the opponent. A third default match within a 12 month period will mean a suspension from sanctioned tournaments for three months and a lost of 50 ranking points after the suspension period has ended. Player retiring from a match during play will lose points as in a regular match.

How good will this new national ranking system gets to be, time will tell. Tennis Canada has claimed Tennis Quebec has been using this framework for more than 20 years with exceptional accuracy. This ranking format is also consistent with the national ranking systems of Spain, France and Germany. Anyone can view the provincial rankings and players' match history through the respective provincial association's website. On the Tennis BC website, information on the Rogers Rankings has not been updated. Tennis Canada updates the national rankings on their website every Friday.