A spectacular Melbourne sunset is the backdrop to a big night match at the Australian Open tennis. Photo: GETTY IMAGES

In among the chaos and fierce debate surrounding the Australian Open this week was the idea that Melbourne’s title as the host of the Grand Slam event was under threat.

Premier Daniel Andrews said that if Melbourne didn’t host the event this year, it could be lost forever.

“If the Australian Open does not happen in Melbourne, it will happen somewhere else,” Andrews said. “It will happen in Japan, it will happen in China, it will happen in Singapore. The real risk then is, it doesn’t come back.”

The Premier’s comments were dismissed by many as political hyperbole and an attempt to justify hosting a tournament that is clearly on the nose with so many Victorians.

But regardless of what you might think about the merits of hosting the event this year, those who believe that Melbourne’s title as Australian Open host is set in stone should think again. Why? Well, just follow the money.

The Australian Open’s biggest sponsorship deal is with Korean car manufacturer, Kia. The deal is reportedly worth $85 million per year, one of Australian sport’s richest deals. This is complemented by other sponsorship deals from Asian companies including Chinese distillery Luzhou Laojiao and Chinese water company Ganten.

The Australian Open is able to attract these lucrative sponsorship deals off the back of rapidly growing Asian audiences.

Over 40 per cent of the Australian Open’s television audience comes from the Asian market, with China representing the biggest and fastest increase in audiences. This has translated into increasing media deals with Asian broadcasters, which earn the Open a cool $80 million a year.

The Asian audience is extremely important to the Australian market given the tournament is played in generally unfriendly viewing times in the important American and European markets.

As these figures highlight, Asia is an integral part of Tennis Australia’s strategy to ensure continued growth and commercial opportunities, but it also reveals the might of the Asian region as a powerful sporting economy.

China is seen as the sleeping giant of tennis. The country of over one billion people is estimated to have 330 million tennis fans and around 15 million players.

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When China’s Li Na won the Australian Open in 2014, over 100 million Chines tennis fans tuned in to watch the final – a figure around four times the entire population of Australia. The weight of those numbers alone highlight that China is an emerging giant of the word’s sports market.

When it comes to tennis, China’s ambition is clear – it wants more high quality, premium tournaments. China already stand alone with the US as the only countries in the world to host ATP Tour 250, 500 and Masters 1000 events. But unlike the US, and Australia for that matter, China doesn’t host a Grand Slam – at least not yet.

In recent years, the Asian region has hosted the Winter Olympics, FIBA World Cup, Rugby World Cup and has the Tokyo Olympics and 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics to come. There is little doubt they’d love to one day add a tennis Grand Slam to their impressive swag of major sporting events.

Of course, Melbourne won’t ever give up its Grand Slam without a fight and nor should it. The growth of the tournament since its move to Melbourne Park in 1988 has been nothing short of extraordinary.

The two-week festival of tennis regularly breaks attendance records, is well-organised, praised as one of the best tournaments in the world by players and fans alike, and in most years is extremely popular with the locals. Known as the “happy slam”, the Australian Open has rarely put a foot wrong and is rightly one of Melbourne’s best events on its sporting calendar.

Melbourne also has a contract to host the event until 2039, but just how watertight the agreement is unknown.

The reality is if the sport of tennis wants to win the hearts and minds of fans in each and every corner of the world, it will continue to invest in Asia and in particular, China. This means that one day, perhaps not too far from now, China may host a Grand Slam event. Whether that’s a fifth major, or one of the existing four remains to be seen, but if the Chinese desperately want it, it will be game on.

So, when it comes to the long-term future of who will host the Grand Slam of Asia-Pacific, while at the moment it’s advantage Melbourne, it’s far from game, set and match.