Rob's Blog » Tennis

Excessive Prize Money to Tennis Players

Rob Wood — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 09:07:37 +0000

The 2012 Australian Tennis Open starts today, and is set to offer the highest prize money in the history of Grand Slam tennis around the world. The total prize pool will be A$26 million, with the men’s and women’s champions taking home a record A$2.3 million (US$2.18 million) each. Does that sound excessive to you? It may be because I am not a great tennis fan, but I cannot see why we need to give them that much. 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 grass roots of their sport.

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World’s Longest Tennis Match

Rob Wood — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 03:40:03 +0000

If you have been focused on the Football World Cup, you may not have noticed that after three days of playing, the longest tennis match in history has just finished – what a marathon. The match was played between between American John Isner and Frenchman Nicolas Mahut at the Wimbledon Championships, starting on June 22 and finishing on the 24th. The match eventually took 11 hours and 5 minutes, spread over three days. The match was won by Isner 6-4, 3-6, 6-7 (7), 7-6 (3), 70-68. The fifth set was the longest set in history as determined by both duration and number of games and the set itself would have broken the previous longest match record of 6 hours 33 minutes. The US Open is the only of the Grand Slams to use a tie breaker in the final set on the singles, the other tournaments use an advantage set, meaning they keep playing until there is a winner by two games clear. As you can see, this can mean a game can go on indefinitely. I hope the others don’t follow the US example and remove the advantage set, as we could miss out of such dramatic games as this.

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Go to Bed Tomic

Rob Wood — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 07:26:05 +0000

Young Australian rising star tennis player Bernard Tomic had a few complaints after his second-round match at the Australian Open against Marin Cilic finished at 2.10am local time. The 17-year-old Tomic was given a wildcard into the tournament, and played well against the vastly more experienced 14th seed Croatian, pushing him to five sets over the course of three hours and 48 minutes. However, Tomic let himself down, and embarrassed many Australians with his comments after the match. He said that if he got the day schedule as requested, that “I think I should have won” … “I can’t see after 1.00am, 2.00am for a 17-year-old to go out and play – It’s difficult.” Welcome to the big world. There are other players who have been playing at these times and winning tournaments. If he wants to be a top 10 player, which he says he does, he will have to learn to handle playing at any time, and he will need to learn to be more gracious in defeat. No excuses.

Related Pages: Australian Open, Grand Slam Tennis, About Tennis

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Balding Agassi Wears Mullet Wig

Rob Wood — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 00:51:25 +0000

Is this the tennis story of the century? I think it is hilarious. In his recently release tell all book, Andre Agassi admits that when he was at the peak of his career, confidently playing in front a huge audiences as the number one ranked player in the world, he was also so self conscious about his receding hairline that he succumbed to wearing a wig. Not just any wig, but a ridiculous mullet wig, boofy at the front and long at the back – the complete antithesis of what was really underneath. And why didn’t anyone notice? I can usually spot a rug a mile off. It just shows that when you have enough money you can pay for a quality toupee.

Related Pages: About Tennis, Andre Agassi profile

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Bad Sport Serena

Rob Wood — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 23:26:44 +0000

In the U.S. Open Tennis Tournament, defending champion Serena Williams was fined $10,000 for her tirade directed at a line judge. She said: ‘If I could, I would … shove [this ball] down your throat’. There were a few expletives deleted from that quote. Can you get a bigger contrast between the champion of men’s tennis, Roger Federer and her? Thankfully such bad sportsmanship has not gone unnoticed, with the big fine and her losing the final match point based on that outburst. She was going to lose the semifinal to Kim Clijsters anyway, and the fine is only a smidgeon of what she earned playing the tournament. Let’s hope she gets punished in more ways, but somehow I think she will not be repentant.

Related Pages: US Open, About Tennis, Roger Federer profile

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Women’s Tennis Prize Money

Rob Wood — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 00:23:55 +0000

It was recently announced that women tennis players at Wimbledon next year will get the same prize money as the men. Why does it have to be so? There is inequality in sport everywhere, but this is not sexist. 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.

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Breaking the Wave

Rob Wood — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 00:24:36 +0000

Yesterday at the Australian Tennis Open we were witness to a Mexican Wave out on one of the smaller courts. An audience wave can come around pretty quickly in a small tennis stadium. They also had a double wave going, the wave going in alternate directions and seemingly passing through each other – I had not seen that before. I have also heard of crowds coming up with combinations, changing speed, and bouncing back in the direction it came. A few stadiums are discussing the option of stopping audiences from making the wave, as it is considered dangerous. Although this wave at the tennis was just a ripple as far as waves go, I would have to agree that they can be dangerous when people start throwing objects and drinks as the wave passes, and it can be distracting if you are trying to watch a game being played. If they can control it so that waves are only done during breaks in the games, and stop people from dangerous trowing of objects. It may be easier said than done, as a log day at the cricket or tennis, after a few beers, people will think they can get away with whatever they want.

Related Pages: Australian Open, Grand Slam Tennis, About Tennis

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