Tennis geography in Italy: figures, context, development opportunities. 

Tennis is certainly one of the sports that in the last few decades has registered in Italy the best performances in terms of people involved, competitive results, infrastructures, and interest from the media. An elite sport for years, tennis has slowly spread among larger and larger population groups, also thanks to a massive propaganda that has enabled even young people with limited incomes to practise it. From the point of view of sport results, after the ’60s and the ’70s – when tennis reached a moment of huge popularity thanks to the individual and team achievements of Italian athletes – the ’80s and ’90 have witnessed a slow decline of the phenomenon. A turning point occurred in the early 2000s, with a radical change of course in the strategic management of the activities and in the whole movement: a new management team started a brand new strategy involving a number of brilliant initiatives that where adopted in the technical and communication fields. Astonishing figures, in contrast to current national economic trends, prove the effectiveness of these initiatives, which have led tennis to be not only the most practiced individual sport in Italy, but also the one with the best media coverage. The creation of a dedicated tv channel (Supertennis) proved to be a powerful means of promoting tennis and a catalyst for its development, as well as an instrument of socio-economic enhancement in some of the territories involved. 

Keywords: Tennis, Communication, Development and Promotion of the Territory.