As Director of Player Relations, Anastasia Skavronskaia is a primary liaison between the PTPA and players, agents, managers, families, and other key stakeholders. Anastasia joined the PTPA over the summer, but her passion for tennis and experience in the sports industry extends much further back. Her parents were both professional athletes, her sister was a professional tennis player, and she played tennis throughout college. After college, Anastasia went on to work on the business and player management side of tennis, including working with legend Martina Hingis and at various tour events.
Learn more about Anastasia by watching the full interview below.
What People Don’t Realize About Life on Tour
While tennis players get to travel the globe and compete on some of the world’s most prestigious stages, Anastasia explains that “it’s not as glamorous as everyone else thinks.”
Constant travel takes a mental and physical toll on the players, and those ranked outside the top 100 can have difficulties just breaking even.
How Anastasia Learned About the PTPA
When asked about her first impressions of the PTPA, Anastasia was honest about how her lack of knowledge on the PTPA influenced her perception. “I think the initial perspective was negative. PTPA is kind of the bad boys of tennis,” she said. However, upon learning more about the organization, she soon changed her mind.
“I realized that that’s actually not the case and that the PTPA is here to help the players and help elevate their voices.”
What Tennis Can Learn From Other Sports
Anastasia knows that the PTPA can learn from and look to replicate successes from players associations in other sports. As an example, Anastasia highlighted the 2012 NHL lockout, where players successfully advocated for greater revenue sharing with the league. She believes that the PTPA can help tennis players achieve similar results when it comes to demanding improvements and their fair share.
“I think it’s good to be able to come together and put your collective bargaining power to use and be able to accomplish things for tennis as a whole and all the players involved.”
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