{"id":249149,"date":"2025-11-07T10:55:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-07T10:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/249149\/"},"modified":"2025-11-07T10:55:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T10:55:08","slug":"aryna-sabalenka-calls-for-urgent-meeting-as-iga-swiatek-issues-warning-tennis-sport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/249149\/","title":{"rendered":"Aryna Sabalenka calls for urgent meeting as Iga Swiatek issues warning | Tennis | Sport"},"content":{"rendered":"

Aryna Sabalenka<\/a> has called for an urgent meeting with the Grand Slams after leading players in men\u2019s and women\u2019s tennis wrote to the four Majors to demand better player welfare and a larger share of the revenue generated by tournaments. The letter, which was written in March, was signed by 20 top tennis players<\/a>, including Novak Djokovic<\/a>, Jannik Sinner<\/a> and Coco Gauff<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the letter, players also asked to be consulted on any changes tournament chiefs were considering if those changes would have a direct impact on them. And the stars also wanted events to contribute towards welfare programmes such as pensions.<\/p>\n

According to AFP<\/a>, a first meeting between players and the Grand Slams took place at the French Open in May, with Sabalenka, Sinner, Casper Ruud, Gauff, Alex de Minaur and Madison Keys in attendance.<\/p>\n

More discussions were held at Wimbledon<\/a> a few weeks later, with former WTA chief Larry Scott advising the players.<\/p>\n

But communication then reportedly stalled over the summer as the Majors told players they would need to resolve other matters first.<\/p>\n

And discussing the situation during the WTA Finals in Saudi Arabia, Sabalenka told the aforementioned news outlet: \u201cI think it’s the time right now to sit at a table and come to a conclusion that everyone will be happy with.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Iga Swiatek<\/a> explained: \u201cFor sure it would be great if the Grand Slams wanted to talk to us, because that’s how it’s supposed to be and I don’t really get why there’s no more open conversation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s not only about prize money, but also about the pension, the health plan and just having more smooth cooperation and communication in the future. So I think for sure it’s a setback and for sure the players are not happy with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

And Jessica Pegula, who is a member of the WTA Player Council, added: \u201cWe’re just trying to be a united voice.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it’s the first time we’ve actually been able to come together with both Tours. And so that’s a testament to just everybody being really open-minded and wanting to come together on making our sport better and better for the players.\u201d<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the All England Club responded by explaining that the organisation is \u201calways open to having constructive discussions to achieve the best possible outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n

They remarked that \u201cregular dialogue\u201d has taken place with players and their representatives, and insisted that \u201cconversations will continue.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aryna Sabalenka has called for an urgent meeting with the Grand Slams after leading players in men\u2019s and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":249150,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[7307,7384,7881,810,8833,6269,101,118,12700,56,54,55,116,87316],"class_list":["post-249149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-aryna-sabalenka","tag-french-open","tag-grand-slam","tag-iga-swiatek","tag-jessica-pegula","tag-meeting","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-tennis-section","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wimbledon","tag-wta-finals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}