Good to Great and Arena Båstad announced today that they are holding a Challenger competition in tennis. The challenger competition creates opportunities for several of Sweden’s top talents in tennis to win important ATP points and advance in the world rankings. The competition will be held in Stockholm on 12–19 November 2023 at the Good to Great Tennis Academy.
Challenger events and WTA 125s are important to then qualify to play ATP/WTA tour events. We have seen several international examples of competitions at this level where players have been able to compete at home and win many important ATP/WTA points and then advance onto the ATP tour. Good to Great Challenger is the first Challenger competition in Sweden since 2018.
The initiators are the three former world players Magnus Norman, Mikael Tillström and Nicklas Kulti who own and run the Good to Great Academy and Christer Hult who together with his team from Arena Båstad, who has extensive experience in organizing ATP & WTA competitions.
”This is a first step in a larger vision to be involved in establishing several ATP Challengers and WTA 125s in the Nordics. We see it as an important part for Swedish tennis and for the development of our tennis talents. We hope that in the long term this will result in more Swedish tennis players establishing themselves in the top 100 in order to qualify for major competitions,” says Christer Hult
”We know that an important part of a tennis player’s development is to compete at the right level, with a Challenger on home ground the opportunity to conquer many important ATP points is created,” says Magnus Norman, partner at Good to Great and Tournament Director for Good to Great Challenger.
“It is a great pleasure for the ATP to welcome Good to Great Challenger in Danderyd onto the 2023 Challenger Tour calendar. The Challenger Tour currently operates in 45 countries, and we are delighted to further expand our circuit’s ever so global horizons in Sweden. The Good to Great Challenger also becomes the second Challenger Tour event in the Nordic countries, a region that nurtures a very deep and special relationship with our sport.
The importance of continuing to provide first-class playing opportunities to professionals at this time cannot be over-emphasised. The enterprise and generosity of such tournaments as the Good to Great Challenger ensure that promising players will not be lost to tennis and the future of our sports is solid”, says Eric Lamquet, ATP Director, Challenger Tour.