All England Club chairman Philip Brook has defended the decision to offer the largest purse in tennis history at this year’s Wimbledon Championships.
Prize money has been a hot topic in recent years and there has even been talk of potential strikes due to players’ frustrations over the percentage of revenue they receive.
Wimbledon have moved to head off such unrest by revealing a 40% increase in prize money for this summer’s tournament, with the £22.6 million pot the largest in the sport’s history.
The new investment was announced at the All England Club in south-west London, where Brook was asked to justify the increased investment at a time in which the country is struggling.
“The economic climate is difficult, I would accept that,” the chairman of the All England Club and Championships said.
“I think we have to accept that the world that we live in is a world where we are competing with other international tennis events.
“We also keep an eye on what is happening in other sports and we do think that this is a moment in time in terms of how we could respond to a subject that has been talked about a lot over the last 18 months.”
The change to prize money will see the winners of the men’s and women’s singles title take home £1.6m, compared to £1.15m last year.
There is an even greater increase for players losing in the early rounds as the All England Club continues to focus on increasing the pot for those players that need it most.
Losers in rounds one, two and three will see a 60% step change rise this year, thereby increasing the prize money for these players by around 90% over a two-year period.
There is also a 41% increase in prize money for qualifying bringing the two-year increase for this group to 71%.
Prize money was one of two substantial streams of investment announced yesterday along with the new Wimbledon Master Plan, a series of new proposals, including the intention to build a retractable roof on Court One for the start of the 2019 tournament.