What’s up the the tennis scoring system? You can have Love, 15, 30, 40, and then win a game. You have to win so many games to win a set. If that isn’t enough, you have to win so many sets before winning the match. When you finally win the match, that means you’ve won the game…I mean match. Confused? Not suprising.
In most other sports I can think of, winning a game simply means that. It’s over. We don’t keep playing games, sets, etc. When you win, you win! This topic has bugged me since I first learned about the scoring system.
Is tennis so easy that you have all that extra time to calculate how many points (more on that in a minute), games, sets, and matches you’ve won…before you actually win? You better bring your calculator to the court.
Love points? What the hell is that? Are tennis players too good for the word zero? In a basketball game the score starts out 0-0. The same for football, baseball, bowling, volleyball, and many others. Tennis has to be difficult and start out Love-Love. Why don’t we all just hug, kiss, and forget about playing tennis. Once you score a point (for lack of a better word), you are winning 15-Love. What happened to 1? After 15, comes 30, 40, and then you win the game. What makes the third point worth less than the first two? It’s not any easier to score that third point. Why isn’t the 4th point worth anything? Would it have been so hard to count from 0 to 4?
In basketball you get 1, 2, or 3 points, depending on difficulty of the shot. In baseball, you get 1 run each time a player rounds the bases safely. In bowling you get 1 point for each pin you knock down and bonuses for knocking all ten down. Gymnastics and figure skating are scored by judges on a scale of 0-10. I think tennis just pulled numbers out of a hat for their scoring system.
Seriously, what would be wrong with playing up to a certain number, like volleyball does. Play the best of three games up to 21 or some other number. Start the score at 0-0, not Love-Love, Angry-Angry, Scream-Scream, or anything else. Each time you score, you get 1 point, not 15 once and 10 another, just because you already were given 15 twice.
I’ve never played tennis, although it does look fun to play. Maybe if they could count like the rest of us, it would be a more inviting game. Then again, maybe tennis players don’t want everyone to start playing.
Nick Momrik 
You’re a dork Nick:lol:
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I think the same thing…tennis is way too confusing to understand the scoring. They should come up with something easier since it isnt that hard of a game to understand…just hit it over the net!
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Oh come on people! It aint that bad… You CANNOT compare different sports.. they all have different rules; first things first Tennis rocks.. lets go back to the scoring system check this link out. Hopefully this helps.. I need to get you out on the courts and explain to u how the shit works..
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I can compare whatever I want…it’s my site! 😉
Direct quote from that site…
But Tennis doesn’t call them points, it’s Love, 15, 30, 40, deuce, advantage, etc. They just had to be difficult!
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I’ve always wanted to do an analysis of every different sport and its rules and scoring. I wanted to compare it to modern day computer games and see if anything can be learnt. Anyway…
I think you highlight two points:
1. Why not just call the points 1, 2, 3 and 4. Well I suppose tradition stops that from happening. But there’s nothing stopping anybody from using those numbers.
2. Why 4 points to win a game (mostly), six games to win a set (mostly) and the first to 2 or 3 sets? Tension. The more important points you seem to have the more exciting it would be. Imagine playing a game of tennis where the winners were the first to 72 points (minimum number needed to win a best of five set match). It could be boring until around 65 points. Another point (pardon the pun!) to consider is that the winner in a tennis match may NOT have won the most points, just the important ones.
Those breaks between games also give the players time to feel the psychological effects of the crowd and other issues. It’s at this time that matches are won and lost.
Lastly, there have been a few sports that have tried to use the tennis scoring system to instil some tension in games. Most fail because it just doesn’t feel right.
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Very interesting comment. I can see why with some of the “points” you make in #2.
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When the game was first being played, back in medieval times, the number 60 was considered to be complete or whole. It made sense for a game to end when a player scored 60 points. Actually playing 60+ serves / rallies would be too much, so they decided to award 15 points per serve / rally. So the scoring would be 15, 30, 45, and 60 (game). Eventually the 45 was shortened to 40, and people quit saying 60 (just game).
The term “love” is supposedly used to represent the fact that someone that consistently plays with 0 points must be motivated by a true love for the game.
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Now we are getting somewhere! Great info!
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To expand at bit (and this may just be BS). 😉
The Babylonians about 4000 years ago used a number system that was base 60. ie 60 was a whole. It however lacked a symbol for nothing (zero). In fact the concept of a symobl for nothing took quite a while to be developed.
Credit the Hindus for the concept of ZERO around 300 AD. And around 600 AD the named shifted to the Arabic “sifr”. The Hindu-Arabic number system moved to Europe, by 976 AD trace are seen in Spain.
Leonardo of Pisa, better know as Fibonacci, who wrote a popular text, Liber Abaci, in 1202 may be credited with introducing the system in Europe.
However in Europe some communities banned the positional number system. The bankers of Florence, for example, were forbidden in 1299, to use Hindu-Arabic numerals. I’ll bet the church had something to do with this.
Returning to tennis then, a game being played in many forms in the time frame that there was no concept of zero. I say that tennis predates the concept of zero in European socitey. Unless one plays tennis with a medieval mathematician in the 1300’s one would need a term for 0 – 0, and the church wouldn’t like you using ‘sifr’ (the Aribic term for empty space – cipher in American-English).
So you better say LOVE – LOVE!
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love-love
i didnt really understand the scoring system could u plz write one that explains trhe whole thing
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Here’s a little better explanation, particularly with the change from 45 to 40 in the scoring. This wasn’t randomly “abbreviated” like some have suggested:
In the fifteenth century in Old French une journee meant “a sport match”, as well as “a day”, and the scoring system was based on the number of hours in a day, and the number of minutes in an hour. Each match consisted of 24 games, which in turn consisted of four winning rallies worth 15 points each. However, it was soon realized that when both sides were at 45 points each, it would be necessary to win two rallies as otherwise the game might be decided on luck. But the total would exceed 60 points and therefore also the number of minutes in an hour, so the score was changed to 40-all with 10 points being given for each winning rally. If there was a tie at 50 points all, the score would go back to 40-all. The game could only be won by winning two rallies in a row. It was the same with the game score. At 23 games all, it was necessary to win two games in a row, or the score would be lowered to 22-all. As matches became too long, the number of games played was lowered to 12 and later to 6.
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Oh, come on, you are a fool, just because you haven’t played it you automatically assume that it is a “crappy” sport. People learn new things every day, why can’t you? But if you really dislike it, why tell everyone else that you dislike it? Maybe you’re just bad at it. WHat sport do you like? im sure if i went around insulting it (baseball with there fat people who barley have to run, or basketball which is almost all black, and you have to be tall, or hockey where it’s all white and there are 3 30 min games or whatever it is).
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What does liking the game have to do with the messed up scoring system?
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I have been bitten by the tennis bug and love (no pun intended) the game. I play 3-4 times a week. What is the difference in football- 2 pts for a field goal, 6 pts for touchdown and 1 pt for an extra point? Then basketball-
2 pts for one basket and 3 pts for a 3 point shot? Go figure! Just learn the scoring system for tennis and play. You might like the game and you will definitely meet some new people.
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The difference in the sports you mentioned is that you get more points for something that is harder to achieve. An extra point super easy, a field goal is easier and a touchdown is the toughest. In basketball you get a 3 pointer if you made a shot from a longer distance from the hoop. Makes sense to me.
Tennis on the other hand does not make sense.
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i came here to find out about the tennis scoring and you just confused me.
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The scoring system of tennis is ridiculous. Im not even going to bother to try and understand it. It’s giving me a migraine tryiong to read your so called “instructions”. You are making it even more complicated.
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I started the tennis team at school like 3 weeks ago and yesterday, out of the blue, the coach told me I was playing at a meet, today. This kind of helped me but I still don’t get it. Thank you anyways
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dude thanks for the article man
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hi, just came by to find out why the scoring is like it is in tennis.
i found the article and comments quite funny and Rod’s post was very informative however im a bit confused still with the points needed to win an individual game (not set or match!)
this refers to the mins in an hour thing and i quote
“Each match consisted of 24 games, which in turn consisted of four winning rallies worth 15 points each. However, it was soon realized that when both sides were at 45 points each, it would be necessary to win two rallies as otherwise the game might be decided on luck. But the total would exceed 60 points and therefore also the number of minutes in an hour, so the score was changed to 40-all with 10 points being given for each winning rally. ”
this sounds correct WHEN both players are say 40-40 because then the game goes on to 50-40 and eventually 60-40 if he wins two points/balls in a row.
BUT if its a whitewash the score would go 15-0, 30-0, 40-0, GAME (or 50-0) so the minutes thing only really counts when a game is pushed as far as possible (ie both players doing well and it being 40-40)
seems weird. they should do 25/50/75/GAME. they wont like but they should.
great game anyway.
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