Sunday, October 4, 2020

Is your 2021 40 & Over USTA League sticking with 4 courts?

The 2020 USTA League season never had a chance to complete with very few areas even able to complete their local league, let alone much of any playoffs.  As a result, means the new (for 2020) 4-court format with one court of singles and three of doubles for the 40 & Over leagues never got to be fully exercised and we never had a chance to see how it would work through playoffs.

My section (PNW) was one that said they'd survey players after the season so opinions would be based on a full season, and a survey was done, but with the COVID-19 suspension of play and no Nationals, USTA National didn't change anything and so my guess is most sections still stick with the same format and rules for 2021 as they had for 2020.

And in fact, in my area the e-mails went out about starting to form teams for 2021 and it was confirmed we will use the same format.

Now, a change I wrote about earlier is that the 40 & Over leagues will no longer have plus-flights, meaning there will be no 4.5+ flights and instead it will just be a straight 4.5 flight with no 5.0s on the rosters.  So that is one new wrinkle for 2021 and it won't be exactly like 2020.

I was critical of the 4-court format change when it happened, partly because it allowed for 2-2 ties with horribly broken tie-breakers, and still feel largely the same, and most agreed with me.  But what do you think now?  Was the 4-court format not so bad after-all?  Has your opinion changed as we head into 2021?

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