https://doi.org/10.1140/epjds/s13688-024-00472-3
Research
Early career wins and tournament prestige characterize tennis players’ trajectories
1
Center for Collective Learning, Corvinus Institute for Advanced Studies (CIAS), Corvinus University, 1093, Budapest, Hungary
2
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Catania and INFN sezione di Catania, 95123, Catania, Italy
3
NEtwoRks, Data, and Society (NERDS), Computer Science Department, IT University of Copenhagen, 2300, Copenhagen, Denmark
4
Center for Social Data Science (SODAS), University of Copenhagen, 1353, Copenhagen, Denmark
5
Complexity Science Hub, 1080, Vienna, Austria
6
ISI Foundation, 10126, Turin, Italy
7
Pioneer Centre for AI (P1), 1350, Copenhagen, Denmark
a
chiara.zappala@uni-corvinus.hu
Received:
11
January
2024
Accepted:
6
April
2024
Published online:
19
April
2024
Success in sports is a complex phenomenon that has only garnered limited research attention. In particular, we lack a deep scientific understanding of success in sports like tennis and the factors that contribute to it. Here, we study the unfolding of tennis players’ careers to understand the role of early career stages and the impact of specific tournaments on players’ trajectories. We employ a comprehensive approach combining network science and analysis of the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) tournament data and introduce a novel method to quantify tournament prestige based on the eigenvector centrality of the co-attendance network of tournaments. Focusing on the interplay between participation in central tournaments and players’ performance, we find that the level of the tournament where players achieve their first win is associated with becoming a top player. This work sheds light on the critical role of the initial stages in the progression of players’ careers, offering valuable insights into the dynamics of success in tennis.
Key words: Network science applications / Success / Sports analytics
Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at https://doi.org/10.1140/epjds/s13688-024-00472-3.
Sandro Sousa and Tiago Cunha contributed equally to this work.
© The Author(s) 2024
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