The purpose of the current research is to discuss how performance analysis of tennis combined with computer simulation can provide information to assist those designing tennis tournaments. The current investigation considers reducing men`s matches to the best of 3 sets and eliminating the second serve in both men`s and women`s singles would impact on tennis at Wimbledon. Data for all completed matches of the 2014 Wimbledon men`s and women`s singles tournaments were collected from the official tournament website (www.wimbledon.org). This allowed the chance of winning points on first and second serve to be modelled in terms of player world rankings. A simulation system was developed to simulate 1000 singles tournaments using different modelling parameters. Six versions of the simulation system were run for the singles games shown in Table 1 and summary information about tournaments was output. The simulations assumed that if players only had one serve, then points would be played the same way current second service points are currently played. Table 1 shows that only allowing one serve increases the number of service breaks and the percentage of matches where upsets occur while also reducing the length of matches, the number of tiebreaks required and the likelihood of higher ranked players progressing within tournaments. If men`s singles matches were reduced to the best of 3 sets there would be more service breaks and upsets with higher ranked players finding it more difficult to progress to the latter stages of tournaments. This use of simulation evidenced by historical match data could provide an economic way for tennis tournament organisers to determine the impact of proposed rule changes without having to run experimental competitions.
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