He's renowned for his innovation but ASB Classic tournament director Karl Budge faces his biggest challenge yet in delivering successful WTA and ATP tournaments in Auckland next summer.
Of course, a lot is out of Budge's control with the coronavirus pandemic causing uncertainty even with the tournaments more than eightmonths away.
"We're pretty fortunate that we were able to deliver probably our best ASB Classics in 2020," Budge said. "A lot of our colleagues around the world have had their events canceled so it's making planning challenging for us.
"We don't know what the future is going to hold, how long this is going to stick around for and at what point we will get back to normal or even semi normal so for us it's trying to have multiple plans in place so we are prepared no matter what the situation that comes at us.
"I think we've got to plan like it's going ahead; my team is certainly planning on delivering the ASB Classic as we know it in January. We're not blinded by the fact that may not happen, but we certainly must act like it is. While we are robustly planning on delivering a normal event, we are also planning on making sure a revised event could be on the cards."
Budge conceded one possibility for a revised event is staging the tournaments with no crowds depending on the alert level New Zealand is at the time. Crowds currently bring in more than 20 per cent of the tournament revenue.
"We have to be flexible in terms of what we want to do and how best we can deliver the best product given the circumstances and that's an option in front of us if we get back to level 2. We are trying to plan on a host of scenarios now depending on where we land and hopefully, we've got a plan ready to go."
There's also a possibility the tournament dates could move slightly depending on when this season ends.
"We are one stop of 52 women's events and 63 men's events so that means there are a lot of moving pieces and we try to get an understanding of how it's going to roll out. The best case is that we've lost 40 per cent of the tour this year and every week that's clearly going up and so what that means for when the season finishes and when the season starts and what might happen to a revised calendar is all up in the air at the moment."
ASB Classic tournament director Karl Budge. Photo / Photosport
With travel restrictions likely to be in place for some time and uncertainty over how long borders will remain closed for, is there a possibility the Auckland tournaments could be moved across the Tasman before the Australian Open?
"I don't know but I think that would be pretty drastic measures for us but we're certainly working closely with Tennis Australia and I've spoken to them four or five times in the past week. There's no point us getting ahead of ourselves here, the priority for players will be playing the Grand Slam and if any tennis can be played in January priority one will be Melbourne. So, we have to figure out how we can best work in with that."
Budge started contacting players about the 2021 tournaments at the Australian Open directly after the ASB Classics, but player negotiations are now effectively on hold due to the coronavirus. However, that's not a major concern for Budge.
"Certainly, from a player field perspective for Auckland if we could get things going again there's certainly going to be no shortage of demand of players wanting to play.
"The challenge for us is timing those conversations with players because New Zealand's not on the radar at the moment as you would understand there are far bigger things at play directly in front of them than worrying about what's going to happen in eight months' time."
