{"id":27088,"date":"2026-06-29T08:55:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T08:55:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/27088\/"},"modified":"2026-06-29T08:55:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T08:55:12","slug":"wimbledon-stars-stand-down-from-prize-money-protest-after-two-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/27088\/","title":{"rendered":"Wimbledon stars \u2018stand down\u2019 from prize money protest after two days"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Leading players at Wimbledon<\/a> will return to normal media duties from Monday after ending their prize money protest following \u201cconstructive meetings\u201d with the All England Club. <\/p>\n

Several star names from the men\u2019s and women\u2019s tours, including world No 1s Jannik Sinner<\/a> and Aryna Sabalenka, had planned to limit their contractual media commitments <\/a>to a symbolic 15 minutes per match day during the first week of the tournament. The 15 minutes referred to their prize money as a percentage of overall tournament revenue. <\/p>\n

Earlier this month, the All England Club announced record prize money for this year\u2019s tournament, confirming their biggest ever uplift in prize money and increasing the overall prize pool by 20 per cent. Wimbledon\u2019s prize money now stands at an overall \u00a364.2m<\/a>; the breakdown of which sees the singles champions win a record \u00a33.6m each and first-round losers receiving \u00a380,000<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The players, who initially welcomed Wimbledon\u2019s announcement as a \u201cgenuine and significant step forward\u201d, estimated that their share of Wimbledon\u2019s projected revenues for 2026 stands at 14.4 per cent and said that ratio is less than their share from 10 years ago – despite revenues growing over that period. Players eventually want to reach a share of 22 per cent. <\/p>\n

Sinner, Sabalenka, as well as Coco Gauff, timed their press conferences on Saturday<\/a>, intending to keep them under 10 minutes. But not all players joined in, suggesting a split within the leading stars who had initially signed letters demanding fairer prize money, contributions to a player welfare fund, and more consultation with tournaments. <\/p>\n

Alex de Minaur, said of the direct action,\u201cWimbledon made a big step in the right direction, and something that should be noted. So this is for me to acknowledge their big step.\u201d Defending champion Sinner also appeared frustrated to be asked about the protest, telling his press conference that he wanted to \u201ctalk about tennis\u201d and shutting down a question on player welfare. <\/p>\n

A statement from the players read: “Following constructive meetings between player representatives and AELTC leadership over the weekend, players have confirmed they will resume normal tournament media duties from Monday 29 June.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis decision is based on Wimbledon’s commitment to return with specific proposals addressing all three points of the players’ July 2025 submission. The underlying matters remain unresolved and players will carefully evaluate the proposals once received. Players will also be providing Wimbledon with further information they have requested in connection with those proposals during the course of the tournament.<\/p>\n

\"SinnerSinner said he wanted to \u2018talk about tennis\u2019 and shut down a question about player welfare (Getty)<\/p>\n

\u201cConstructive dialogue with Wimbledon and the other grand slams will continue. The players and the club will make no further comment at this time.”<\/p>\n

Wimbledon were said to be \u201csurprised and disappointed\u201d by the collective action, are were shocked that the record increase in prize money did not prevent protests from the players.<\/p>\n

The grand slams argue that the players\u2019 representatives underestimate the costs of running tournaments and staging important warm-up events. There has also been multi-million-pound investment into player facilities at the All England Club, including the renovation of the Millennium Building this year.<\/p>\n

Additionally, Wimbledon asked Larry Scott, the former chief executive of the WTA and an experienced sports administrator who had been leading the protests, and the players\u2019 representatives for financial records of tour events to understand where the 22 per cent revenue-sharing ratio comes from, but it is understood those details have not yet been provided.<\/p>\n

During Wimbledon, the players\u2019 representatives will also hold meetings with both the French Open and US Open. Last month, the players expressed their \u201cdeep and collective disappointment\u201d<\/a> at the prize money on offer at the French Open after organisers announced a 9.5 per cent increase, and the tournament will present their response to the players over the next fortnight. The US Open will also announce their prize money for the 2026 tournament in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27089,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[607,1122,602,366,596,613,435,219,603,5526,609,113,9779,28,578,285,611],"class_list":["post-27088","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wimbledon","tag-all-england-lawn-tennis-and-croquet-club","tag-color-image","tag-england","tag-grand-slam","tag-horizontal","tag-international-tennis-federation","tag-italy","tag-jannik-sinner","tag-london-england","tag-looking","tag-photography","tag-sport","tag-sports-training","tag-tennis","tag-uk","tag-wimbledon","tag-wimbledon-lawn-tennis-championships"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27088","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27088"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27088\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}