Tennis is a racket sport that has roots back in the 1300s, but it started developing as a sport in the 19th century. Since then, it has developed into one of the most popular sports in the world, trailing only the likes of football (soccer), basketball, and cricket.
The sport was initially played on the grass courts, but now we know multiple surfaces on which tennis can be played on. On the tennis tours, hard courts, clay courts, and grass courts are used, but there are also carpet courts and many other different materials of tennis courts that still exist, even if they are not so used anymore.
Tennis is a relatively undemanding sport in terms of equipment, as only a tennis racket, a ball, and a tennis court are needed to compete. The most basic tennis shots are serve, forehand, backhand, and volley. The tennis referee is called the umpire.
There are three main governing bodies right now in tennis. The Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), the Women's Tennis Association (WTA), and the International Tennis Federation (ITF).
Both the ATP and the WTA oversee tennis tournaments on their respective Tours, for which tennis players earn points in the ATP Rankings and the WTA Rankings, while the ITF takes care of the Grand Slam tournaments, which are the four most prestigious tennis tournaments in the world - Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon, and US Open.
Professionally on both Tours, tennis is played by thousands of tennis players from more than 100 countries, and there are more than a thousand of tennis tournaments held across all categories every single year.
Tennis is also an Olympic sport, and even though it was not always a part of the Olympics, tennis has been part of the Summer Olympics every time since 1988.
