Konta: Give women more credit
More players putting on top-quality matches, says Briton
WUHAN: Female tennis players still do not receive the credit they deserve for putting on top-quality matches, according to British No. 1 Johanna Konta.
A lot of women’s matches this season were outstanding,” Wimbledon semi-finalist Konta said at the Wuhan Open in central China this week.
“More credit needs to be given. There is so much talk that the women’s draw is so open. But it’s open in the sense of there are so many amazing players. We have the depth.”
Although women have been paid equal prize money at all four Grand Slams since 2007, they still lag behind the men on their own year-round tennis circuit.
In 2017, the men’s ATP World Tour had a total prize money pot of US$ 197.7mil ( RM836mil), compared with US$ 139mil (RM588mil) for the women’s WTA Tour.
While Novak Djokovic trails 23-time Grand Slam singles winner Serena Williams by 11 Slam titles, the Serb is the sport’s all-time prize money leader with US$109.8mil (RM464mil) in earnings. Williams has amassed US$84.5mil (RM357mil) in her long career.
Although tennis is one of the few professional sports where female athletes can earn a good living, women’s sports generate a minuscule 0.4% of all sports sponsorship and just seven per cent of all sports media coverage, according to London-based charity Women in Sport.
Konta, the world No. 7, was involved in one of the best matches of the year at Wimbledon, fighting back from a set down to beat the second-seeded Simona Halep of Romania to become the first British woman to reach the last four at the All England Club in 39 years.
There have been many other notable clash- es this season.
Eugenie Bouchard beat Maria Sharapova in Madrid in a highly-anticipated grudge match, eventual champion Garbine Muguruza overcame former top-ranked Angelique Kerber at Wimbledon and unseeded Latvian Jelena Ostapenko thumped 54 winners to beat Halep in the French Open final.
“It’s incredible what is happening this year, because it’s very different from the previous year where maybe one or two players are dominating,” Muguruza told reporters in Wuhan.
“We feel like every week there is the best players, that we’re very close, a lot of diversity.”
Konta took part in a panel discussion with the British consul general to Wuhan, Nick Whittingham, to talk about gender equality and the empowerment of young women in China. — Reuters