Top tennis players have threatened to boycott Australian Open – Tennis News
There is a chance that most of the top players on the ATP World Tour would boycott the next Australian Open due to the prize money row.
Higher ranked players, who reach the latter stages at big tournaments, are fighting for their colleagues, whose rankings are not good and they fail to reach the second week of Grand Slams. The problem is that the organisers of
Grand Slam have fixed huge prize money for players reaching latter stages but they pay quite less to the ones who lose in the first round.
It is being heard that Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), which governs the men’s tennis, is even planning to organise an alternative event at the time of Australian Open.
Most of the top tennis players will gather for a meeting during the US Open to discuss this issue further and decide what to do. Roger Federer, who is the head of the ATP player’s council, is leading his fellows on this issue.
Former world number one, Andy Roddick, also thinks that tennis players are getting far less than the professionals from other sports. The American knows like everyone else that lower ranked players are not even getting even what
they are investing.
Talking to the reporters in a recent interview, Roddick said, "Compare the percentage of revenue dedicated to prize money or salaries in tennis to other sports. At the majors our prize money is still in the teens, percentage wise,
but the NBA is at a crossroads because the players earn 50% of revenue.”
He added, "I think we all feel very fortunate for what we get, but we are putting people in seats. The guys ranked 80 to 90 to 1,000 in the world aren't making the big bucks right now, and they're paying their own expenses, which
you don't do on a professional sports team. That is who any action would benefit."
First round losers get least prize money at the first Grand Slam of the season, the Australian Open, compared to other Majors. Organisers at Melbourne Park paid just $20, 800 to the players who went down in the first match in 2012.
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