tennis stars – Top men’s and women’s tennis players will keep protesting over a larger share of grand slam revenues at Wimbledon. After limiting pre-tournament media duties to 15 minutes at the French Open, they’re extending their protest through the end of Wimbledon’s first
The message is already in motion inside Wimbledon’s daily rhythm: on Saturday, the protest starts again, and it doesn’t end after the opening headlines.
Top men’s and women’s tennis players have decided to continue their protests for a greater percentage of grand slam tournament revenues at Wimbledon. They will extend the protest until the end of the first week of the tournament, also limiting their post-match media duties during the event.
This comes a month after the top players chose to limit their pre-tournament media duties at the French Open to 15 minutes. Now. their representatives have pledged to run the same kind of pressure campaign through the early days of Wimbledon—beginning with the pre-tournament media day on Saturday. then continuing from Monday 29 June to 5 July.
The players’ dispute with grand slam tournaments has been building since the tours’ top names joined together to send a letter to organisers of each grand slam. In that letter. they requested a greater percentage of prize money revenues. contributions to player welfare funds. and the formation of a grand slam player committee. After a year of minimal movement, the prize money pot announced for the French Open pushed the group further.
Their response was a boycott of everything except mandatory media obligations during their pre-tournament media day in Paris. They refused to speak with the broadcast rights holders, who paid the tournament significant amounts of money.
The All England Club had been trying to prevent a confrontation. After meeting player representatives during the French Open, the club announced a record prize money increase of 20% for this year’s championships. The total was set to rise to £64.2m.
The player group acknowledged the significant rise, but the new total still didn’t match what they had pushed for. They pointed to a gap between what they wanted and what Wimbledon is offering: they said the revenue share at Wimbledon stands at 14.4%, while the player group was pushing for 16%.
Wimbledon tennis protests prize money revenue share players welfare funds All England Club grand slam player committee