What statistics can tell us about strategy in tennis

TL;DR

This paper analyzes tennis tiebreak results to determine if players employ strategies or if outcomes are purely random, finding most results align with chance-based expectations.

Contribution

It introduces a statistical approach using binomial distribution and chi-squared tests to assess strategic behavior in tennis tiebreaks.

Findings

Most players' tiebreak results match random chance predictions.

Some players show deviations suggesting possible strategic behavior.

Results support the hypothesis that tiebreak outcomes are largely aleatory.

Abstract

In this paper we analyse tiebreak results from some tennis players in order to investigate whether we are able to identify some strategy in this crucial moment of the game. We compared the observed results with a binomial distribution considering that the probabilities of winning or losing a point are equal. Using a $\chi^2$ test we found that, excepting some players, the greatest part of the results agrees with our hypothesis that there is no hidden strategy and the points in tiebreaks are merely aleatory.