Davis Cup news: France withdraws from the bidding process

Davis Cup
Davis Cup trophy

The French tennis federation (FFT) has announced that it has pulled out of the bidding process to host this year’s Davis Cup group stages due to financial and logical challenges.

The host cities for the group stages of the competition had already been finalised by the International Tennis Federation as they had confirmed that Bologna, Glasgow, Hamburg and Malaga would be hosting the tournament which takes place between September 14 to 18.

However, Malaga was chosen to be the host city for the knockout stages of the competition and therefore another city would have to take it’s place in the group stages, so bidding from other countries was opened.

The FFT believed that they were unfairly excluded from this bidding process and as a result took their case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) last month but in the end the federation were made eligible to submit a bid.

But in the end the FFT conceded that they couldn’t carry on with their proposal to be Malaga’s replacements and have now withdrawn from the process.

“After finally being able to review the complete specifications in the designation of the host cities, the FFT has decided not to submit a bid in view of the onerous financial and operational conditions which no potential organiser in the French territory was willing to accept,” the FFT said in a statement.

“The FFT’s desire to promote and revitalise the Davis Cup is stronger than ever.

“In the interest of this competition and of tennis, the FFT wishes to contribute to the reflection on the sporting format of the competition and the evolution of its economic model to make it more attractive.”

The Davis Cup has gone through many format changes over the years after it’s formation in 1900, but the most recent change stopped the home and away ties with a World Cup finals style format.

Davis Cup

Latest