It may be because I am not a great tennis fan, but I cannot see why we need to give the players that much money.  As it is a grand slam event, you don’t need to offer large amounts to entice players to come and play.  The winner of any tennis grand slam event will probably boost their off-court earnings more than that anyway by being more marketable.

Some of you probably will not agree with my next comment (and that’s OK). Another thing that bugs me is that the event organizers have decided that both the men’s and women’s champions will earn the same amount (in 2007 Wimbledon decided to do the same), despite more interest in the men’s side of the tournament, with longer more entertaining games, and consequently better revenue-raising potential.

I’ll still be watching the men’s final, and afterwards, I hope they can give a little back of their millions to the grassroots of their sport.

Related Pages: Australian Open, Tennis

Athletes in most Olympic sports and many other international sports do not get anywhere near as much as tennis players, and most likely work just as hard, but it is just the way it is. It comes down to market demands, if people are paying to watch them play, to buy products etc, then there will be money in sponsorship and gate fees that can be passed on to the players in the form of payments and prize money.

If women tennis players want to get paid more, they should entertain us more, increase the quality of their play, make reasons for people to come and watch, and give us value for money. I am not saying that they are all like this, but I see are too many fat, lazy, bitchy, rich kids which are not good for the image of females in sport. If you looked at most of the high-profile women’s sports, they don’t need a pay rise – they are getting paid too much already.

Related Pages: Wimbledon, Tennis