How is the 4-court format working for 2021 40 & Over Nationals? How are the ties being handled?

The USTA changed the 40 & Over division to a four court format for 2020, but with no Nationals last year, this year's Nationals was the first chance for it to be used.  The big issue is with four courts, there is a clear possibility, if not significant probability, that matches will end in 2-2 ties.  If that happens, who wins?

I wrote about how it all works a couple weeks ago, but now with most of the 40 & Over events complete, we can take a look at how things have played out.

So far, there have been 202 team matches played at 40 & Over Nationals, and of these, 64 have ended tied 2-2 on courts.  Of these, 38 had a winner declared based on who lost the fewest sets.  That leaves 26 matches going to the next tie-breaker, loser of the fewest games where 24 were decided.  That leaves two matched tied on all the criteria, which means the winner is the team that won court 1 doubles.

Note, there were eight other matches that were within a game or two of being full ties and having to go to the court 1 doubles winner tie-breaker.

First, regular readers of my blog know I've been critical of the tie-breakers the USTA uses for standings at Nationals where sets and games lost are used.  Let me say that in the case of a head-to-head match, the tie-breakers are not "flawed" and are in fact objective and not omitting information that should be used.

Note however that when the USTA first made the change to four courts, they did not have a provision to determine a winner if tied on games lost, and had to add using the winner of court 1 doubles after the fact and after a number of league matches ended in complete ties.

That said, in my opinion, it isn't terribly satisfying to have a match determined not by who wins the most courts, but instead by inspecting finer grained statistics.  One of the beauties of tennis and its scoring system is that winning a match doesn't require winning the most games or points, and winning a match in a super tie-break is a win just like a lopsided straight-sets win is.  But when there are an even number of courts and 2-2 ties can happen, it forces the use of these tie-breakers fundamentally changing the strategy of a team match.  A captain now has to worry about not just winning courts, but instead how the courts are won as there is a chance that will be used to determine the winner.

Now, change isn't necessarily bad.  One might argue that this format and use of tie-breakers discourages sacrificing a weaker player/pair against a strong pair, since a lopsided loss could hurt in the tie-breakers, and that is a good thing.  In a way, this gives the advantage to the deeper team and reduces the changes the "little guy" can pull an upset.  If you want the "better" team to win more of the time, this change is probably a good thing.

I still contend it was a mistake to go to a four court format, for this "2-2 tie" reason but others as well, but after a couple of years of it being used and one Nationals being nearly complete, what do you think?