PARIS, June 25 \u2014 Many of the world\u2019s top-ranked men\u2019s and women\u2019s tennis players will step up their protest at their share of revenue at Wimbledon, a statement said yesterday.<\/p>\n
After limiting their participation in media day ahead of the the French Open in May, the players will this time limit their media commitments to 15 minutes for the whole first week of the championships, which start on June 29, said a statement released on their behalf.<\/p>\n
It said 15 minutes reflected \u201cthat Wimbledon currently pays slightly below 15 per cent of revenues to players as prize money\u201d.<\/p>\n
Player representatives have written to Wimbledon\u2019s leadership to inform them of the planned action.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlayers are also aware that recent public comments from Wimbledon\u2019s leadership have questioned the principle of a revenue-sharing formula \u2014- the very foundation of the proposal,\u201d said the statement. \u201cIt is difficult to reach a structural agreement while the structural premise is being contested.\u201d<\/p>\n
The statement also demanded a player welfare fund and a formal player council, and said the players had tabled the issues a year ago.<\/p>\n
The release did not name any participating players, but at Roland Garros seven of the then-top-ten ranked men and women took part.<\/p>\n
A spokesman for the All England Club, the owners of the Wimbledon courts in southwest London, expressed their sadness at the players\u2019 proposed action after an increase in overall prise money by 20 per cent this year to \u00a364.2 million (RM348 million)<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are surprised and disappointed by this action,\u201d the spokesman told Britain\u2019s Press Association news agency.<\/p>\n
\u201cWimbledon puts the players at the heart of all our decisions and we invest significantly in them every year. This year\u2019s total prize money fund has increased by 20 per cent to \u00a364.2 million, which is the largest increase in our event\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is alongside investing hundreds of millions of pounds in upgrades to our player facilities as part of a three-year transformation to create a world class player performance environment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Former Australian Open champion Madison Keys told AFP in May that \u201cmany players\u201d were united on the question of Grand Slam prize money and that they would boycott a major tournament if their voices were not heard.<\/p>\n
Four-time Grand Slam winner Jannik Sinner, also speaking in May ahead of Roland Garros, stopped short of calling for a boycott of the sport\u2019s major events but called for a higher level of respect.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe give much more than we are getting back. It\u2019s not only for the top players; it\u2019s for all of us players,\u201d Sinner said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not nice that after one year we are not even close to conclusion of what we would like to have.\u201d \u2014 AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PARIS, June 25 \u2014 Many of the world\u2019s top-ranked men\u2019s and women\u2019s tennis players will step up their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":758582,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[6568,64,63,1806,754,68138,362600,85,747,749],"class_list":["post-758581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-all-england-club","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-grand-slam","tag-jannik-sinner","tag-madison-keys","tag-player-welfare-fund","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-wimbledon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=758581"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758581\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/758582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=758581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=758581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=758581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}