How do you entice the best players in the world to a professional tennis tournament that will end little more than 12 hours before the Australian Open tees off 700 kilometres away?
Alicia Molik, until recently the Billie Jean King Cup captain for Australia and newly appointed tournament director of the Adelaide International – a WTA 500 and ATP 250 mix – has a very clear idea.
Unsurprisingly Molik, who grew up in the South Australian capital, sells her gig well.
Where better for the best players to spend a few days pre AO she asks? The parallels between South Australia and Victoria are many.
Take the courts, the AO cushion acrylic hard mix matches those in Adelaide. Melbourne’s famous ‘four seasons in one day’ mantra aside, the weather is generally identikit, hot and dry. Sport matters widely also, in both states.
“The facility sells itself at the Drive (the newly rebadged and revamped former Memorial Drive). From when a player lands in Adelaide, gets to the hotel and walks to the practice site, it’s easy. The changing rooms are within (the abutting) Adelaide Oval, the gym is expansive, we’re in among the parklands,” she says.
“In the week before a Grand Slam players want the perfect amount of preparation, they don’t want to be rushed and want a lot of access to practise. It’s their last chance to get all their preparation completed and if you leave it until arriving in Melbourne, you can’t catch up. Match practice and all the little extras players need happen here in Adelaide. It’s low-key to a degree, comfortable, players tend to enjoy the freedom around the grounds.
“I’ve been to a lot of stadium events around the world and they can be sterile. Here, players are walking over the bridge, seeing the river and open spaces. Player dining supersedes many events and they have an Incredible view of the city.
“It’s the final tune-up (for the AO), a bit boutique, it still has a club feel and it’s intimate. Players feel it when they are playing, they like interacting with the crowd.”
Before even a ball has bounced, Molik is hugely impressive. Passion is at a premium clearly as is the quality of player to be found here this week.
> VIEW: Adelaide International 2024 women’s draw
“The field is very strong, particularly on women’s side, the cut off was 31,” the tournament director says of a 30-player draw.
The entry list is indeed mind-blowing. The WTA players start with 2022 Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina (world No.4) followed by world No.5 Jessica Pegula and the reigning Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova. Dig deeper and you’ll find former world No.2 player Paula Badosa (merely a wildcard entrant), three-time Grand Slam champion Angie Kerber and so on.
Checking out the qualifiers is even more instructive, British No.1 Katie Boulter, Camila Giorgi, Kristina Mladenovic, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and more.
The men are no less impressive, top-seeded American Tommy Paul (world No.13), Sebastian Korda, a good chunk of Italy’s recent Davis Cup winning team and a serious Aussie bite too, local favourite (and 2022 champion) Thanasis Kokkinakis, Alexei Popyrin and the conqueror last week of Rafael Nadal, Jordan Thompson.
Paul, a semifinalist at last year’s Australian Open, is adamant about his ultimate tennis ambition with Adelaide an important part of his prep.
“I would take winning a slam over making top-10 for sure. I think everyone wants to win a slam,” he said.
“I’ve played this tournament a bunch. I actually really love the conditions here, I think it’s a great tournament to come to before Australia.
“I hope I can play some really good tennis this week and kind of catch a groove. I haven’t played a match in two months so no matter what you do in practice, you can never really recreate the feelings that you get in a match and that’s what we’re all out here to do and obviously try and win also.
“At the US Open Series all the tournaments feel pretty different. So to have a lead-in tournament that has super, super similar courts is great.“
> VIEW: Adelaide International men’s draw
Pegula, at age 29 and yet to reach the last four of a major, faces a very different expectation this month. A question about her inability to-date, to break through this barrier was cooly, albeit politely, received.
“Well, I think I’ve said this before, but I just need to win my quarterfinal match and I’ll be past it,” she said.
“Seriously, that’s kind of all I need to do. I feel like I’ve put up obviously great stats over the last couple years, super consistent, had a great run at the finals, so hopefully maybe beating that many high-calibre players back-to-back will give me some confidence maybe later in a slam.”
Playing doubles to an equally high level (she is a Roland Garros 2022 finalist) may be the key to the last four or beyond.
“I love playing doubles. I think it’s helped me a lot in my game, I work on a lot of intangibles, playing pressure points, a lot of serve return practice, working on your feel around the court, lobs, strategising, reading what the opponents are doing.
“I’d much rather do that than sit and think about my next singles match where I tend to overthink or players tend to overthink. So that can be kind of tough sometimes. I like to break it up with playing doubles. That’s just enjoyable for me.”
Badosa meanwhile, returning after a long spell out with back and other injuries, was like the cat who got the cream.
“I think I’ve never been more excited to come back to start the year. Normally I would say I’d finish the year one month ago but in this case it’s been a lot of months, so (I’m) really looking forward to playing here. It’s a tournament I always like to play, also, so very excited.”
Talk of whether she might pair up with boyfriend Stefanos Tsitsipas on court in Melbourne – they were due to team up at Wimbledon before injury struck Badosa – was dismissed instantly but with a smile.
“Mixed doubles? I will have enough I think with my singles there,” she said.
>VIEW: Adelaide International day order of play
Back to Molik.
Any tournament will stand or fall on the calibre of its players and accompanying quality. Molik is in no doubt that her years as a touring top-10 player in addition to a decade at the helm of the Billie Jean King Cup team will count in attracting and retaining the very best.
An obvious career entrenchment within the women’s game will also not hold her back when it comes to bringing the best male players to South Australia she says.
“My strength is establishing relationships, I am not a shy person, it’s important to form relationships and I hold a huge interest in men’s tennis.”
It is a curiosity, and boon, of elite sport that while the headline names can dominate disproportionately, the possibility of unearthing a star on the rise, the next big thing, catches the breath like little else.
“I remember training here when Novak (Djokovic) was 16 and came to Adelaide for the first time,” recalls Molik.
“He was a skinny, scrawny little kid with a big smile, so happy to be here, You want to try and find these guys, as much as it’s the big names, we need to be mindful too of young emerging players.
“Lleyton won (in Adelaide) when he was 15 and beat Andre Agassi in the final. We want emerging young emerging and players who form a connection with the crowd and will come back the next day.”
As it should, the Australian Open 2024 promises much. So too does the Adelaide international.
Very much.
> BUY NOW: Tickets for Adelaide International 2024