Wimbledon, played at the All England Lawn Tennis Club in SW19, is one of the worlds most respected and revered tennis tournaments.
Wimbledon is a great tournament which is not defined by the final alone. It produces impossible drama in week one as well as week two and in both the ladies and men’s tournaments. The atmosphere is electric and irreplaceable; the long summer nights, the celebrities and royalty strolling about and applauding their sporting heroes alongside the fans and the traditions of strawberries & cream are all factors which make this tournament in SW19 extremely special.
Last year, the All England Lawn Tennis Club announced that the prize money for 2013’s Wimbledon would be 40 per cent higher than the prize money offered during the 2012 championships.
Not bad, is it? 2012’s singles winners – Roger Federer and Serena Williams – each walked away with £1.15 million for their victories. In 2013, men’s singles winner Andy Murray pocketed an impressive £1.6 million for his win over Djokovic, and the women’s singles champion Marion Bartoli walked away with the same amount.
It is not only the singles Champions who walk away with large winnings. The Finalists walked away from the tournament with £800,000 in prize money, while semi-finalists and quarter finalists won £400,000 and £205,000 respectively.
Players who didn’t make it all the way to the finals didn’t leave empty handed; reaching the last sixteen earnt you £105,000 and making the third round paid out £63,000. If you were knocked out in the first or second round in 2013 you still walked away with a £23,500 or £38,000 prize, respectively.
Wimbledon’s generous prizes for non-winners are part of the tournament’s appeal – these generous sums are instrumental in helping the tournament attract not just the biggest names in tennis, but many of the tennis world’s upcoming talents.
The tournament’s organisers believe that raising lower-level prizes makes it easier for newer players to compete as professionals. It hasn’t always been this way – just two years ago, players that were knocked out during the first round of the games in 2012 walked away with little more than £10,000 in prize money.
This year’s prize money will be an incredible £22.6 million – the same as it was for the 2013 tournament. Critics believe that the prize money has been influenced by player feedback, something that Wimbledon’s organisers deny.
All England Lawn Tennis Club Chairman, Philip Brook, claims that Wimbledon organisers “listen” to the players but that “no negotiations with players of the ATP or WTA tour” are taking place.
The Wimbledon prize money is in line with other tournaments, and, as former British number one player Greg Rusedski pointed out, most of the top-ranked players are more interested in winning titles than in winning money.
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