“All that touchy-feely stuff and the sharing of secret plots between points is truly off-putting. They should make plans, have a big cuddle in the dressing room and use the court for playing tennis, not kissie-kissie peek-a-boo,” writes ROBERT MACKLIN. 

Well, the Aussie Open was okay, though I’m sure we would all have preferred a Djokovic/Sinner final in the men’s singles. 

Curious chap, Sinner. Speedy around the court, not weighed down by a personality of any kind. Alas, his German opponent seemed to be carrying at least two of them.

The women’s singles result was a delightful surprise. Even the ebullient Madison Keys seemed stunned before bursting with joy.

Call me old fashioned, but I find Sabalenka’s oral explosions each and every shot as verging on the intimidation of her opponents.

On the practice court she was as silent as the snow falling on Minsk. And how come they banned her Belorussian flag because of the Russo-Ukrainian war? If they did the same to an Israeli player, it would be an antisemitic outrage.

But all that’s by the way; what really bemuses me is the slow death of the doubles competition. They no longer play five-set matches – three if you’re lucky and a 10-point tie-breaker if both sides are even after two and six all. It’s almost as though they’ve become an embarrassment to the organisers, and the sooner they’re done and dusted the better.

The stands are only ever half full and the applause desultory at best, even on the rare occasions when a rally goes beyond four strokes. And since money follows popularity, the prizes are now rock-bottom compared with the millions tossed around among the singles players.

The doubles game itself has become hard to watch, especially for those of us brought up on the centre court adventures of Tony Roach and John Newcombe, or even Rod Laver and Ken Rosewall.

All that modern touchy-feely stuff between partners, and the sharing of secret plots between every single point is truly off-putting. They should make their plans before the match, have a big cuddle in the dressing room if necessary, and use the court for playing tennis, not kissie-kissie peek-a-boo.

But that’s not all. Despite the commentary from Todd Woodbridge – who might well be partly to blame for its descent – the modern players have figured out how to end a point in several ways. It turns out that half a tennis court is too much for two trained humans to defend.

Todd says it’s like a game of chess. I beg to differ. It doesn’t get beyond the intellectual discipline of draughts (or checkers). The average point rarely goes beyond four strokes and ends with an unplayable volley at the net or a crosscourt forehand that zooms into the tramlines. Ho-hum.

So, what changes do we need to make to revive doubles and bring excitement back to the game that we can all enjoy watching once more? I guess the simplest solution would be to take the outside tramline away. But then the person at the net on the serving side would surely have too much control over the return. And that could lead to even fewer strokes per point.

Here’s another possibility. How about introducing a third player on each side? Their job would be to cover those shots that bounce beyond the outer tramline or the end serving lines, thus allowing the two other players on each side to concentrate on all the other groundstrokes and volleys inside the lines.

Of course, the new players couldn’t be everywhere; they’d have to choose which side to cover but they and the other two players on each side could plan their game around the positioning of all three team members. I know it’s a big step, but we need to act now. Something must be done or we’ll lose one of the delights of the ancient game forever.

Perhaps fellow doubles lovers will have ideas to refine this “triples” suggestion; or something entirely different might tickle the fancy of a clever column reader.

robert@robertmacklin.com