Murray supports radical rule changes being tested in Milan
(Reuters) - World number one Andy Murray has voiced his support for changes designed to speed up tennis being tested at the inaugural Next Generation ATP Finals in Milan this November.
The tournament for the leading tour players aged 21 and under will feature a new scoring system, no lets, limited medical time-outs and shot clocks as the men’s governing body seeks ways to appeal to younger audiences.
The scoring system is the most radical change to the traditional format, with five-set matches decided through first-to-four-game sets, instead of the usual six, with tiebreaks played at 3-3.
“Tennis is doing very well right now but that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s going to be the case in the future, so I think it’s important to try new formats, different scoring systems and see if it works,” Murray told reporters.
“It is good to try new things... at least it’s trying something different. You have to give credit for doing that, because tennis has often been accused of being too traditional, not wanting to try new things.”
The only new rule that Murray specifically opposed was the noadvantage scoring rule, where each game will be decided by a suddendeath point at deuce.
“I would prefer to try a shorter set with the same scoring, rather than the sudden-death deuce points,” Murray added. PARIS, (Reuters) - Claudio Ranieri, the veteran Italian coach who led Leicester City to their English Premier League title last season against all the odds, has taken over at Nantes, the Ligue 1 club said on Thursday.
The club confirmed that the 65-year-old responsible for one of the most outrageous success stories in modern football had signed a two-year contract in what it described as a “nice coup by the Nantes directors.”
It will be Ranieri’s second stint in France after he led AS Monaco out of the second division in 2012-13 and then to second place in Ligue 1 the following season.
Ranieri replaced Portuguese Sergio Conceicao, who led Nantes from the relegation zone in December to a seventh place finish this season but then resigned to take charge of Porto in his homeland.
The well-travelled Ranieri has coached eight different clubs in his homeland, including Juventus, AS Roma, Inter Milan and Napoli, plus Atletico Madrid and Valencia in Spain, Chelsea and Leicester City in England and the Greek national side.