By Sebastian Fest Jan 12, 2009, 20:24 GMT
Madrid - Educated at the best universities, young, brilliant, family-loving and convinced of the power of public relations: such is Adam Helfant, the new strongman of men's tennis.
Adam S Helfant, 44, a US citizen and a former employee of sports gear giant Nike, will have to push into oblivion the failed experiment around the South African Etienne de Villiers, who quarrelled with a large portion of the players, including the top ranking players, Spaniard Rafael Nadal and the Swiss Roger Federer.
'Both support him, and that is good,' a man who often talks to Nadal and Federer told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa with reference to Helfant.
Helfant is set to be ATP executive chairman and president, a measure of power that has never before been granted to anyone at the head of men's tennis.
'There is no doubt that men's professional tennis is one of the world's most popular sports and, as a lifelong fan, it is a great honour to have been given the opportunity to take the helm at such an exciting time for the ATP,' Helfant said when his appointment was confirmed.
The deal took longer than expected to announce because several contractual issues were pending, a non-negligible question for a man whose basic annual salary as Nike's Global Sports Marketing vice- president was 1 million dollars. Benefits, stock options, incentives and other concepts made that figure almost anecdotal.
The young executive won the race against, among others, WTA boss Larry Scott, former French Open director Patrice Clerc and former Australian Open director Paul McNamee.
An engineering graduate from the prestigious MIT and a law graduate from Harvard, Helfant appears to have his own clout to control the web of money, egos and alleged historic rights that players and tournaments are immersed in.
Helfant was until early 2008 Global Sports Marketing vice- president for Nike, a company with which both Nadal and Federer have lucrative sponsorship contracts.
With the new boss, a US citizen returns to the top of men's tennis. The ATP was led by US citizen Mark Miles for 15 years, and De Villiers succeeded him and held the job for three years.
Unlike De Villiers, who arrived from Disney as an outsider in the world of tennis, Helfant knows sports and knows tennis players well.
He grew up in New York as a great fan of sports who in his own words wanted to play shortstop for the Yankees, quarterback for the Jets and score for the Knicks.
'At the start he did not want to hear anything about it,' a tournament director told dpa at the start of negotiations. 'But then he gradually became interested.'
The challenge that is facing Helfant is huge, and it will not come free of charge. Years ago, when asked about his greatest disappointment, he answered that he would have liked to spend more time with his family.
Now things look grim for the executive in that sense: with 63 tournaments across 32 countries, the ATP tour is set to draw him even further from his loved ones, and longer than ever before.
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