With implosion of Kosmos’ reimagined event, the Davis Cup runs dry

WATCH: Auger-Aliassime clinches the Davis Cup for Canada

Then [in 2018] we experienced the new [Davis Cup] format, that looks like not perfect any more. The players are complaining. But the players are complaining always about any format that we [are] going to have, so. . . I don't know what is the perfect situation. Rafael Nadal, during Media Day in Melbourne, on news about the collapse of the revamped Davis Cup

The sudden, unexpected collapse of the Davis Cup, seemingly rescued in 2018 by angel investor Kosmos in a headline generating, 25-year, $3 billion deal, brings to mind a host of cautionary proverbs, the most germane of which may be: The perfect is the enemy of the good.

For years, critics grumbled about the admittedly unwieldy format as well as the onerous commitments that Davis Cup demanded of top players. But then, it is the oldest of all international team sports competitions (first played in 1900), and for nearly 125 years it has continued to captivate legions of fans. In most nations, large, festive crowds, fueled by Olympic Games-grade patriotism, reliably turned out for Davis Cup. The problems lay in the long run-up to the year-end final.

It’s all gone now, as of the International Tennis Federation’s announcement last week that the deal with Kosmos is terminated.

“The ITF can confirm that its partnership with Kosmos Tennis for Davis Cup is ending…” read a terse statement, in part “…financial contingencies are in place and as the custodian of the competition we will operate the 2023 Qualifiers and Finals as scheduled.”

The ITF is taking over the administration of this year’s event with the Spanish city of Malaga, the projected host city for the Finals (Nov. 21-26), agreeing to stay on board. But after that, who knows?

The implosion of Kosmos’ reimagined event was predicted by many from the jump, but it was so swift and unheralded that tennis insiders and even administrators were taken by surprise. Multiple sources, reluctant to weigh-in with public pronouncements, told TENNIS.com that Kosmos probably had an “escape clause” built into its contract and chose to exercise it when recent attempts to renegotiate its deal with the ITF fell through. Representatives for David Haggerty, President of the ITF since 2015, said he would have nothing to add to the opaque, official ITF statement.

While the Davis Cup has not been pronounced dead, it may be in its last throes. The Kosmos deal represented a capitulation by the ITF to the cries of reformers from within and without, most of whom professed to love the competition but wanted to see it streamlined in order to more consistently attract top players and greater revenues. The revamp accomplished neither, but it does point toward another trusty proverb: If a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Struggling through two dismal offerings of the event, Kosmos petitioned the ITF to move the event to Abu Dhabi for five years starting in 2022. The ITF was poised to rubber-stamp the deal until the plan became public and triggered a backlash. At the time, Aussie doubles legend Todd Woodbridge said, “It’ll become a 14-day event finishing in mid-December. What player in their right mind is going to go to Abu Dhabi and give themselves two weeks off before starting the new season?”

The assessment of Nadal, that arch-realist, was spot-on. But most of the players who have complained about the Davis Cup formats aren’t indifferent or blind to the honor and satisfaction of playing on a team for their respective nations—look no further than at the ecstatic reactions of the American team that recently won the brand-new United Cup. All along, the players have had to navigate the demands of a time-consuming, potentially exhausting competition which many of them had no chance of winning due to the lack of a deep roster.

The United Cup may be about as close as we can come for now to some semblance of Davis Cup.

That problem, as Kosmos learned, just won’t disappear due to the structure of a calendar that has just kept getting more crowded. And now it doesn’t help the ITF that it has been left with a real loser—the ruins of a historic, beloved event that is more than ever a square peg on a board full of round holes. Nevertheless, Davis Cup is still revered by many.

Responding to the most recent news, Paul McNamee, formerly CEO of the Australian Open, tweeted: “With the collapse of the ITF Kosmos partnership, Davis Cup will again come under the microscope. There will be accusations and recriminations, and enormous speculation. Amid the noise, I want to shout out at the top of my voice that it is a competition worth saving.”

Bear in mind that McNamee is the founder and CEO of Hopman Cup, the old January event featuring mixed teams of men and women. It was the precursor to the just-concluded United Cup, which kicked off to rave reviews. Speaking for many competitors following the American win, world No. 3 Jessica Pegula said: “It's been amazing to spend time with these guys and start the year like this. It's been super fun and already super memorable.”

The United Cup may be about as close as we can come for now to some semblance of Davis Cup. The five-match format is a satisfying nod toward the original competition, and the mixed-teams concept proved popular (it also improved the chances of some lesser tennis powers). The first edition was a hit, which could not be said for the ATP Cup, the player organization’s challenge to Davis Cup. That disaster certainly undermined the Davis Cup, but it did little else and lasted just three years (2021-23).

The United Cup is basically Davis Cup light, which—loathsome as the concept may be to OG Davis Cup stalwarts (including myself)—is maybe the best Davis Cup we can hope to have for now. As the proverb has it, It’s a mistake to throw good money after bad.