While many people spent time with close-by friends and family to celebrate the end of the year we decided to try something new and attended the Mubadala World tennis championship in Abu Dhabi. What an opportunity to see six of the best male tennis players play live in front of us. Plus, the chance to get a picture taken with them or an autograph. One of the reasons we tried this for the first time was the ease of access to the tickets online and for a reasonable price given the prominence of the players. In other countries tickets would have sold out in one day or less. But here it seems it is an “open” secret and one could even had access on the last day through the official website.
Our favourite player and the one we were most excited about was Milos Raonic, our Canadian ranked ATP world number 3. Sure, Andy Murray (No. 1) from Scotland/UK was a good one to watch, too, and Rafael Nadal (No 9), obviously. Since this championship is an invitational one and does not count towards the ATP title the players are quite relaxed and there is a playful, fun attitude in the air.
This continues outside the stadium as well in the “tennis village” with interactive booths, contests, children’s activities, food and beverage stations and autograph sessions. As so often in the UAE this is a very family friendly event and the “tennis village” was open to the public free of charge. Only when entering the seating area around the court a ticket was required. We liked our seat in category 2 and enjoyed our bird’s eye view. Sometimes it was a bit challenging to see if a ball was “in” or not, but that happened to the players as well as the challenges requesting the electronic line judge for certain points showed.
The games on day 2 and 3 kept me on the edge of my seat as the players I was rooting for didn’t play as well as expected (by their ATP ranking). In the end our favourite players were Rafael Nadal as he played every one of his games with zest and motivation and David Goffin (from Belgium) who fought his way to play the final against Nadal to only lose it in a tie-breaker. He made Nadal work for his win and is one of the young players to watch out for next season!
I couldn’t resist a selfie with the two youngest players: a surprised Raonic and a very cute David Goffin…:) (in front of a big poster).
May 2017 be a Happy and peaceful one for you all! Maike
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