Wimbledon Agrees to Equal Prize Money
Women Players Will Receive as Much as Men
By KRYSTYNA RUDZKI
AP Sports
WIMBLEDON, England (Feb. 22) – After years of holding out against equal prize money, Wimbledon bowed to public pressure Thursday and agreed to pay women players as much as the men at the world’s most prestigious tennis tournament.
The All England Club announced at a news conference that it had decided to fall into line with other Grand Slam events and offer equal pay through all rounds at this year’s tournament.”
Tennis is one of the few sports in which women and men compete in the same event at the same time,” club chairman Tim Phillips said. “We believe our decision to offer equal prize money provides a boost for the game as a whole and recognizes the enormous contribution that women players make to the game and to Wimbledon.”
In short, good for tennis, good for women players and good for Wimbledon.”
Last year, men’s champion Roger Federer received $1.170 million and women’s winner Amelie Mauresmo got $1.117 million.
The U.S. Open and Australian Open have paid equal prize money for years. The French Open paid the men’s and women’s champions the same for the first time last year, although the overall prize fund remained bigger for the men.The head of the French Tennis Federation, Jean-Francois Vilotte, suggested that the French Open could follow Wimbledon’s example, though no decision is expected before the federation’s next meeting March 16.
Here is the full story.
I don’t mind equal pay for equal work. In tennis, don’t women play just 3 sets while men play 5?
Have you seen the ratings for men and women tennis? Women’s rating is nearly double the men. So should the women get more money? Susan attracts a bigger crowd and interest than 99% of other GMs. Should she be paid by her worth or rating?
Equal pay in tennis is nothing to do with gender equality. Tennis, like all sports, is part of the entertainment industry. That is to say that the players get paid based on the popularity of the sport with viewers and supporters. If indeed the women attract more viewers then they should be paid more, regardless of the fact that they are not as good at tennis as the men.
I doubt this to be the case but is the basis for the argument. In fact the avergae woman at the grand slams, before the “equal pay” took home more money than the men as the fact that they play 3 sets enables them to play in doubles and mixed doubles competitions.
Niall
Professional tennis, like other professional sports is indeed in the entertainment business. And in some sports, like tennis, women are a bigger draw than the men, and thefore deserve bigger pay.
It may very well be possible that women attract now as many viewers than men. But I suspect this has more to do with the looks of Kournikova & Sharapova and the length of their skirts than the quality of their play.
In a sense a similar trend can be observed in chess. Women’s chess has attracted more sponsors (aka money) as the players got younger and much more attractive. Nobody wanted to see the veiled Georgian top players of the 80s no matter how good they were. I bet the interest will go up even more once FIDE decides that women have to wear short skirts and tank tops. You think I am kidding that this will never happen? Just look to volleyball or .. tennis.
Eventually the men will demand equal treatment, and will be cut back to best-of-3 sets. And why shouldn’t they demand equal treatment?
Everyone wants to work less. WCChamp chess matches used to be longer than 12 games. Heavy-weight title fights used to be 15 rounds. It is a trend.
And yes I have seen the TV ratings for men vs. women over the years. The TV ratings fluctuate, with the men usually having higher ratings; especially in rounds before the final match.
GeneM
Many will disagree with me, but this is the dark side of the feminism.
I am, by all means, agree that for equal performance, in anything, people should get equally paid, regardless of gender, age, whatever other known criteria. Except, tennis is exactly where women are far from true equality. True, it is not their fault, but nor is the fault of a 5’2″ man who can never become a basketball star.
As far as the sport itself goes, women can’t compete with men. That’s why there is separate league for tennis, that’s why they don’t play against each other (except in mixed doubles). Some of you may remember the 55 years old Bobby Riggs, although defeated by on the top of her game world’s best Billy Jean King, Rigss still took ten games from King. More than Roddick took from Federer in their last match. So, there would be little argument that men play better tennis, as far as the sport itself goes.
Many claims that tennis not only a sport, but entertainment too. True, it is. Yet, in that department women simply play less. The best two out of three is less tennis than the best three out of five. Sometimes women’s tennis match is over after 50-70 minutes.
I am quoting some tennis experts: the depth of women’s tennis is very shallow. The rare supertalents, like Serena Williams can come back after not playing for long time, overweight, out of practice, somewhat injured, yet still can win a major, just by showing up.
The ratings on tv are less for women’s tennis than for men’s tennis. Exceptions are the finals, not even those all the time.
So, no matter where I look, I simply fail to see the equality.
Gabor
I’m ruminating on which tennis matches are most ‘important’ for me to watch, as a fan. To me, women’s matches provide the most exciting viewing; I like long rallies, I like shot variety. The women no-longer play ‘moon ball’ tennis, like they did before the days of Chris Evert. Their shots are strong, the women are athletic, and they assay the full range of tennis technique. Too often, the men’s matches are blowouts – their power game is just ‘smashes’ which either WORK and the player wins, or DON’T WORK, and the player loses.
Watching Federer blowout after blowout is not ‘entertaining’. Then again, Sharapova’s total collapse against Serena in Australia wasn’t particularly entertaining, either. Neither are women’s matches at the lower levels (out of the top 30) – they still lob ‘moonballs’ back and forth! What IS entertaining is a well-played, close match. This seems to happen more with women’s matches then men’s.
While I like to say that I can ‘admire’ the appearance of some of the female athletes (makes a good wall-calender), this is also not a ‘requirement’, and I don’t believe should be taken into consideration as regards MY enjoyment of the tennis. For example, when Linday Davenport lost the U.S. Open two years back to Svetlana Kusnetseva, that match was GREAT – it was close and exciting! (It was also disappointing, since I was pulling for Lindsay, who seems to choke in the big ones; really – she just doesn’t manage to successfully RAISE the level of her play, like some others do – that’s what happened when Venus beat her in last year’s Wimbledon). But these girls are not exactly calender faire. It’s not a requirement for ME. But still, where money is concerned, with sponsers coming, for example, from the world of fashion, make-up, etc. then perhaps one has to take appearance into consideration with the women’s ‘big money’ matches.
But I agree that I am disquieted at the equal pay for significantly shorter matches. The women may consider this equitable, but I could certainly see points in the counter argument. The issue is whether the money comes from viewership ratings, or from actual work performed – and I guess it comes from ratings. After all, that’s why sports salaries can get so high, in general.
So let the girls have their dough; I’m ok with that. I’m not ok with some recent clamoring by doubles players, who are ALSO pushing for higher prizes; to me, watching doubles tennis is among the most boring viewing possible; I’ve tried, but can’t take it. Every short rally appears to be exactly the same (serve, return, cutoff volley by netman, etc.). If entertainment value is what it’s all about, then I’d say they don’t have a leg to stand on.
Women are better at ‘tennis entertainment’ so should get more money. Men are taking money they did not earn from the TV ratings.
This tv ratings arguement just does not wash at all! If we were to take it to the logical conclusion, we should put Brittany Spears, Jennifer Lopez, and Angelina Jolie in tennis shorts and stick them in a tournament. Ratings would go through the roof.
That’s what you get if it is ratings instead of performance that matters.
On the men’s side, fire the top seed and put in George W. Bush. How many people would tune in to see him get his clock cleaned?
Compensate players based on ratings instead of performance? PUH-LEASE!
Jack,
Money follows nice looking women playing entertaining tennis, not nice looking women playing bad tennis (such as Ms Jolie).
Money follows nice looking women playing entertaining tennis, not George Bush playing bad tennis.
Women create the revenue, they should get the reward.
Men do not create so much revenue, they should not steal someone else’s money.
jack le moine,
It has absolutely evrything to do with entertainment (and thus partially tv ratings). The argument for putting Britney Spears on court is not quite valid (tho might still pull a crowd) since people who watch tennis still want to see tennis of a certain calibre! The 3 sets to 5 sets is also irrelevent in this regard, as if people derive more entertainment from a 3 set womens match than a 5 set mens match then there is no reason why they should not be paid more. The reason it has nothing to do with gender equality is because, if one were to take Britney Spears as an example, she does not get paid the same as a male singer on the basis of her sex, but rather the entertainment that she provides.
Niall
I take a bit of a middle ground here. Its clear that men are better at tennis than women, they cannot compete head to head, but in their own sections I find both equally interesting to watch.
I think woman deserve the same pay as men, I agree with the comments here that you are paying for the entertainment and both sexes are equal in this respect. I do think though that woman should play 5 sets in order to receive equal pay, or that the men’s game should be reduced to 3 sets.
I would be interested in Susan’s thoughts on this debate?
I actually don’t see why women should get the same pay in grand slams, unless one considers the 3 set matches for women the equal of 5 sets for men. I understand it was looked into, and the five set matches are too tiring for women. There’s a considerable difference playing a three or five set match, for me the grand slams should definitely remain that way for men, and in fact it hasn’t been in question, though lesser tournaments have best of three set matches. You don’t start dabbling with a hundred years of tradition. While entertainment, tennis has not bowed too low from the sporting aspect. But if the work load for a woman’s physique is the same, then the equal pay is reasonable, it’s not supposed to be a test of endurance only. In a physical sport there is no point in comparing men and women’s events directly; the top 1000 male players will beat the number 1 woman, the men are just stronger and faster, with equal skill.
For tv watching, I find the men and women’s play complementary. I like men’s tennis perhaps more, because, while a child can hit the ball out of the stadium, strength gives more variety also, and it is harder to hit a winning shot because men will run down more balls. However, equally entertaining is women’s tennis, a tense struggle with perhaps different style players is interesting. If the pace is slower, it does not matter.
As to tv ratings, I think the top women, who attract all those watchers who perhaps would otherwise watch tennis, they get full recompense from their sponsors. All those clothing, racket etc deals they have. The thumb rule for the very top is that they get 30% of their pay from prize money, but it rises sharply as you leave the top ten. And then of course Kournikova didn’t win a single tournament, but still possibly earned more than Hingis, way above the men. Well, Kournikova was more a celebrity than tennis player, but I just want to point out that the women do get their pay.
So, I guess the crowd who favors paying women less because they only play 3 set matches instead of 5 would have no problem paying the men who crush their opponents 6-1 6-2 6-2 less money. The US and Australian Open have been paying both sexes equally for years now and I think few have had any real problems with it. The ones that are complaining the most are the ones least affected.
In the grand scheme of things the women work and train just as hard and long as the men. The hours of practice and training that goes into making a world class tennis player is just as long and hard for men and women. The extra 2 sets don’t really count much in the grand scheme of things.
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