ABSTRACT
The virus-fuelled devastation of Covid-19 has not spared sports, including those in playing-mad New Zealand. This chapter uses a key idea from crisis management studies to examine one major sport, tennis, before, during, and after the sledgehammer impact of the novel coronavirus. It suggests that the most challenging period of all is the one after the worst of the crisis has peaked. It is then that sports bodies need not only to “move on” but also to re-evaluate their previous business model, asking whether it is fit for purpose on a post-Covid-19 playing field. Tennis in New Zealand has engaged with the issues, planning major adjustments to the way it operated before, and will operate, post-Covid-19. It will put much more emphasis on grassroots participation and open facilities even to those who do not wish to affiliate with a club. The chapter suggests that other major sporting codes might follow tennis’s lead.
