I'm a big fan of the women's game, and in particular a big fan of
Serena and Justine (how I miss that backhand!).
But for some reason when I blog 9 out of 10 of my posts are on the
mens tour. Not sure why, it's certainly not a conscious decision, it
just seems to work out that way.
And without wishing to over theorise, maybe it reflects the fact that
often the womens game (as good as it is) is still over shadowed by
Roger and Rafa.
But this week, is the womens week in the sun, with the end of season
tournament in Doha, beginning on Tuesday.
One thing the WTA tour has got right is it's naming partner Sony
Ericsson. And the guys at Sony Ericsson deserve credit for what they
invested in helping increase the profile of the womens game.
Like a number of other big brands who are involved in music or sports
sponsorship they have rightly sought to be a partner rather than mere
sponsor.
A perfect example of this is their media partnership with the Sunday
Times this weekend. The Times, the biggest selling 'quality' Sunday,
today carried a 4 page pull out preview to the Sony Ericsson
Championships.
For far too many people in this country the tennis season begins with
Queens and ends at Wimbledon. No paper could ever justify spending the
money on something like the end of season round robin event, so by
making this happen Sony Ericsson and The Sunday Times have given the
profile of the game a boost, and done the sport a real favour.
What's more in a nice touch, Sony Ericsson have also developed a new application - Mobile Event Guide - which fans attending the end of season event can download for free. The app is updated by Bluetooth when users walk through Sony Ericsson kiosks at the venue, and provides schedules and results, video and pictures of matches player info and post match analysis. Very cute.
Being a sponsor means slapping your logo on something, but as Sony
Ericsson have shown, to be a partner you have to put more in, but you
get so much more back.
The centre piece of the preview is a feature on Serena. You can read it here.
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