The Dubai Tennis Championships or Dubai Open (also known as the ''Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships'' for sponsorship reasons) (formerly known for sponsorship reasons as the ''Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships'' and the ''Dubai Duty Free Men's and Women's Championships'') is a professional
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...
tournament
A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses:
# One or more competitions held at a single venue and concentr ...
owned and organized by
Dubai Duty Free
Dubai Duty Free (DDF) is the company responsible for the duty-free operations at Dubai International Airport and Al Maktoum International Airport.
Founded in December 1983, DDF recorded first-year sales of US$20 million and has grown into one ...
and held annually in
Dubai
Dubai (, ; ar, دبي, translit=Dubayy, , ) is the most populous city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the capital of the Emirate of Dubai, the most populated of the 7 emirates of the United Arab Emirates.The Government and Politics of ...
,
United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (The Middle East). It is located at th ...
on outdoor
hardcourt
A hardcourt (or hard court) is a surface or floor on which a sport is played, most usually in reference to tennis courts. It is typically made of rigid materials such as asphalt or concrete, and covered with acrylic resins to seal the surface and ...
s.
The tournament takes place at the end of February and organizes a men's and women's event. The tournament takes place under the patronage of Sheikh
Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum
Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum ( ar, محمد بن راشد آل مكتوم, links=no; ; born 15 July 1949) is the vice president, prime minister, and minister of defence of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) as well as the ruler of Dubai ...
, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai. In 2001 the ATP upgraded the tournament from an
ATP 250 level to a more prestigious
ATP 500 level tournament. On the
WTA Tour
The WTA Tour is a worldwide top-tier tennis tour for women organized by the Women's Tennis Association. The second-tier tour is the WTA 125K series, and third-tier is the ITF Women's Circuit. The men's equivalent is the ATP Tour.
WTA Tour tou ...
, it alternates yearly between a
WTA 1000
WTA 1000 tournaments is a category of tennis tournaments on the WTA Tour, governed by the Women's Tennis Association. The old WTA Premier Mandatory and Premier 5 tournaments merged into a single highest tier and it is implemented since the r ...
level tournament and a
WTA 500 WTA may refer to:
Organizations
*Washington Trails Association
*Whatcom Transportation Authority
*Waskahegan Trail Association, the management board for the Waskahegan Trail
*Water Transit Authority, former name of the San Francisco Bay Area Water ...
level tournament. Prior to the 1990s there was an annual Dubai Tennis Championship played at the British Embassy.
The Dubai Tennis Championships was the third tournament in pro tennis history to award equal prize money for both men and women, until 2021.
The courts usually have a medium-fast speed considered to be similar in speed to the Shanghai and Swiss Indoor (Basel) courts.
History
The Dubai Tennis Championships debuted at the Aviation Club in 1993 as an ATP 250 tournament.
At the time there was no formal stadium and the tournament was hosted on hardcourts surrounded by temporary scaffold seating to host a total of 3000 viewers across all courts.
In 1996, the Dubai Tennis Championships took place at the newly erected Dubai Tennis Stadium at the Aviation Club. The construction of the Dubai Tennis Stadium also led to the development of various food & beverage entertainment locations in and around the stadium base, like the Irish and Century Villages. In 2012, a 293-bedroom hotel was constructed on-site that hosts many of the players and officials during the 2 week event.
The inaugural ATP men's tournament was won by
Karel Nováček
Karel Nováček (born 30 March 1965) is a retired Czech former top ten tennis player born in Prostějov, Czechoslovakia (Czech Republic). In his career, Nováček won 13 singles titles and six doubles titles. His highest singles ranking was Wor ...
in 1993 who was ranked world number 23 at the time. The inaugural WTA women's tournament debuted in 2001 as a
Premier tournament and was won by
Martina Hingis
Martina Hingis (, sk, Martina Hingisová; 30 September 1980) is a Swiss former professional tennis player. Hingis is the first Swiss player, male or female, to win a major title and attain a world No. 1 ranking. She spent a total of 209 weeks a ...
.
For five years, Swiss
Roger Federer
Roger Federer (; born 8 August 1981) is a Swiss former professional tennis player. He was ranked List of ATP number 1 ranked singles tennis players#Weeks at No. 1, world No. 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for 310 weeks, in ...
, on the men's side, and Belgian
Justine Henin
Justine Henin (; born 1 June 1982) is a Belgian former professional tennis player. She spent a total of 117 weeks as the world No. 1 and was the year-end No. 1 in 2003, 2006 and 2007. Henin, coming from a country with limited success in tenni ...
, on the women's side, dominated the singles' tournaments. Between 2003 and 2007, Federer and Henin each won the singles title four times. However, in 2008, neither player managed to reach the finals;
Andy Roddick
Andrew Stephen Roddick (born 30 August 1982) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. He is a major champion, having won the 2003 US Open. Roddick reached four other major finals ( Wimbledon in 2004, 2005, and 2009, and the US Ope ...
and
Elena Dementieva
Elena Viacheslavovna Dementieva (, ; born 15 October 1981) is a Russian former professional tennis player. She won the singles gold medal at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, having previously won the silver medal at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. ...
became the new champions. Currently, the reigning champions are
Aslan Karatsev and
Garbiñe Muguruza
Garbiñe Muguruza Blanco (; born 8 October 1993) is a Spanish-Venezuelan professional tennis player. She has a career-high singles ranking of world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA), and a career-high doubles ranking of world No. ...
.
In 2005, the Dubai Tennis Championships implemented equal prize money policy becoming the third professional tennis event to do so after the
US Open and
Australian Open.
2009 Shahar Pe'er visa controversy
In February 2009, Israeli player
Shahar Pe'er
Shahar Pe'er ( he, שחר פאר, ; born ) is an Israeli retired tennis player.
Pe'er won five singles and three doubles titles on the WTA Tour, as well as four singles and three doubles titles on the ITF circuit in her career. She reached ...
was denied an entry
visa
Visa most commonly refers to:
*Visa Inc., a US multinational financial and payment cards company
** Visa Debit card issued by the above company
** Visa Electron, a debit card
** Visa Plus, an interbank network
*Travel visa, a document that allows ...
by the
United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (The Middle East). It is located at th ...
, a country that did not have diplomatic relations with Israel at the time. Tournament director Salah Tahlak said that Pe'er was refused on the grounds that her appearance could incite anger in the Arab country, after she had already faced protests earlier at the ASB Classic over the
2008–2009 Israel–Gaza conflict. A number of top-seeded players, among them
Venus Williams
Venus Ebony Starr Williams (born June 17, 1980) is an American professional tennis player. A former world No. 1 in both singles and doubles, Williams has won seven Grand Slam singles titles, five at Wimbledon and two at the US Open. She is ...
, condemned the action not to grant Pe'er a visa.
In response, the Dubai Tennis Championship was fined a record US$300,000. The fine was appealed by DTC, but the WTA Tour Board rejected the appeal.
[http://fr.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1242212395267&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull] Pe'er was awarded a guarantee to enter the next (2010) edition of the event, plus US$44,250, an amount equal to the average prize money she earned per tournament in 2008. A number of highly ranked tennis players, including 2008 winner
Andy Roddick
Andrew Stephen Roddick (born 30 August 1982) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. He is a major champion, having won the 2003 US Open. Roddick reached four other major finals ( Wimbledon in 2004, 2005, and 2009, and the US Ope ...
, pulled out of the men's event (ATP 500 Dubai) which was scheduled to take place the week after the women's event. As a result, the UAE issued Israeli
Andy Ram
Andreas "Andy" Ram ( he, אנדי רם; born April 10, 1980) is a retired Israeli professional tennis player. He was primarily a doubles player, and competed in three Olympics.
He is the first Israeli tennis player to win a senior Grand Slam ...
a visa for the men's tournament.
Past finals
In the men's singles,
Roger Federer
Roger Federer (; born 8 August 1981) is a Swiss former professional tennis player. He was ranked List of ATP number 1 ranked singles tennis players#Weeks at No. 1, world No. 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for 310 weeks, in ...
(winner in 2003–05, 2007, 2012, 2014–15, 2019, runner-up in 2006, 2011) holds the records for most titles (eight), most finals (ten), and most consecutive titles (three), sharing the last record with
Novak Djokovic
Novak Djokovic ( sr-Cyrl, Новак Ђоковић, translit=Novak Đoković, ; born 22 May 1987) is a Serbian professional tennis player. He has been ranked world No. 1 for a record total 373 weeks, and has finished as the year-end No. 1 ...
(winner in 2009–11, 2013, 2020, runner-up in 2015). In the women's singles,
Justine Henin
Justine Henin (; born 1 June 1982) is a Belgian former professional tennis player. She spent a total of 117 weeks as the world No. 1 and was the year-end No. 1 in 2003, 2006 and 2007. Henin, coming from a country with limited success in tenni ...
(2003–04, 2006–07) holds the record for most titles (four) and shares with
Venus Williams
Venus Ebony Starr Williams (born June 17, 1980) is an American professional tennis player. A former world No. 1 in both singles and doubles, Williams has won seven Grand Slam singles titles, five at Wimbledon and two at the US Open. She is ...
(2009–10, 2014) and
Elina Svitolina
Elina Mykhailivna Svitolina ( uk, Еліна Михайлівна Світоліна, ; born 12 September 1994) is a Ukrainian professional tennis player. She reached career-high rankings of world No. 3 in singles and 108 in doubles. Svitolina ...
(2017–18) the record for most consecutive titles (two). In men's doubles,
Mahesh Bhupathi
Mahesh Shrinivas Bhupathi (born 7 June 1974) is an Indian former doubles world No. 1 tennis player. In 1997, he became the first Indian to win a major tournament (with Rika Hiraki). With his win at the 2006 Australian Open mixed doubles, he ...
(1998, 2004, 2008, 2012–13) has won the most overall titles (five), and co-holds with
Grant Connell
Grant Connell (Pronounced: KAHN-nell) (born November 17, 1965) is a former professional tennis player from Canada, and has been a real estate agent for the past 14 years in Vancouver. He specializes in West Vancouver North Vancouver and Downtow ...
(1995–96) the record for most consecutive titles (two). In women's doubles,
Liezel Huber
Liezel Huber (née Horn; born 21 August 1976) is a South African-American retired tennis player who represented the United States internationally since August 2007. Huber has won four Grand Slam titles in women's doubles with partner Cara Blac ...
(2007–09, 2011–12) took the most titles (five) and, alongside partner
Cara Black
Cara Cavell Black (born 17 February 1979) is a Zimbabwean former professional tennis player. Black was primarily a doubles specialist, winning 60 WTA Tour and 11 ITF doubles titles. A former doubles world No. 1, she won ten major titles. By ...
(2007–09), the most back-to-back titles (three).
Men's singles
Women's singles
Men's doubles
Women's doubles
References
External links
ATP tournament profileOfficial website
{{coord, 25, 14, 34.33, N, 55, 20, 33, E, type:landmark, display=title
Tennis tournaments in the United Arab Emirates
Sports competitions in Dubai
Hard court tennis tournaments
ATP Tour 500
WTA Tour
Recurring sporting events established in 1993