Tennis star Mahesh Bhupathi, who is the brain behind the International Premier Tennis Leaque (IPTL), is hoping to include a team from China in future and have eight teams on board by 2020.
The inaugural edition of the USD 40 million event will feature four star-studded teams. The 24-match tournament, which will be played in a round-robin format, will start off in Manila from November 28-30.
Touching on the future of the tournament, Bhupathi said “Ideally, we would like to get to eight teams by 2020.”
Bhupathi hopes to include a team from China and play the tournament in a major Chinese city in the future.
“We are hoping for a big splash from the tournament,” he added.
“But we need to be sustainable and we don’t want to be too aggressive. We want to make sure that along the lines other people also see it as a viable business model,” he told during a visit to promote IPTL in Singapore.
Serena Williams, Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras, Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray have teamed up in the four teams from the Manila, Singapore, Delhi, and Dubai.
The Singapore leg of the tournament will be played from December 2 to 4, before it reaches Delhi (Dec 6-8) and Dubai (Dec 11-13).
