Venus is right – women do get raw deal
Equality issue is a simmering distraction at SW19, reports
Men are from Mars and women are from Venus. That is the enduring belief of those who feel sexism is as much a part of Wimbledon as strawberries and cream.
From Venus Williams’ disgruntlement at being banished to a court far away to Andrew Castle, the BBC commentator, apologising for talking about the looks of a male player’s girlfriend, the equality issue is a simmering distraction.
Martina Navratilova, one of the stellar names of all tennis, said Wimbledon should have a policy of staging an equal number of men’s and women’s matches on Centre Court and No 1 Court.
As usual, yesterday’s schedule featured twice as many men’s matches.
The 59-times grand-slam winner also got into a Twitter squabble after saying the decision to put Williams on No 18 Court ‘‘stinks’’.
Her detractor accused her of wanting organisers to lose money by not filling seats on show courts.
She called him stubborn and replied: ‘‘Simply put, this is the right thing to do as the slams are great because women and men all play.’’
They do not play on a level playing field though. Analysis shows that in the past 10 years only one former men’s Wimbledon champion, Lleyton Hewitt, has been forced off Centre Court or No 1.
Seven women have suffered the same fate.
In total, former women champions have been snubbed by the show courts on 46 occasions in 10 years, while men have suffered the same fate only 15 times.
Williams, the five-times champion, returned to No 1 Court yesterday where she treated the crowd to an epic against Darya Kasatkina.
She led 7-5 4-6 7-6 and had just engineered match point when the heavens opened and her week grew more frustrating still. At that point her sister was playing on Centre Court and both games were being screened on the BBC. So is there a problem?
Venus Williams, at 36 the oldest top-eight seed at a grand slam since Navratilova in 1994, said she had no problems playing on outside courts.
Her issue was that men were not being treated the same way. ‘‘There shouldn’t be exceptions or any inequality to it,’’ she said.
The analysis is proof that inequality is alive and ill. In 2012, no male champions played anywhere other than Wimbledon’s main courts, but Venus Williams did, Petra Kvitova did and Serena Williams did twice.
The Williams sisters and Amelie Mauresmo have also been sent outside as defending champions. No 2 Court’s former status as the graveyard of champions might add some historical context, but the stats say women have had a raw deal in the past decade.
Wimbledon said it considers many factors when scheduling matches. In a statement, the organisers said: ‘‘The major marquee players will normally be scheduled on the stadium courts with Centre Court and then No 1 Court seeing the leading names.
‘‘This is expected by both the paying public and TV audiences alike. Players with a large following will usually, by necessity, scheduled on courts offering greatest security.’’
Williams’ remarks are not the first time that Wimbledon has been dragged into a sexism spat. Last year, Caroline Wozniacki crashed out at the quarterfinal stage and refused to go quietly. She openly accused the All England Club of sexism. ‘‘The women really haven’t got the opportunity here to play on the big courts,’’ she said.
‘‘A lot of us women feel like we deserve to play on the big courts in front of a big crowd.’’
She was backed up by Serena Williams, who said there was a ‘‘huge conversation’’ that needed to be had by tennis chiefs.
Wimbledon solved the annual pay-scale debate in 2007 when they decided to give the men and women’s champions the same prize. However, the sport as a whole has remained pockmarked by sexism rows.
It moved centre stage this year when Raymond Moore, the chief executive of the Indian Wells tournament, said that if he was a female player, he would ‘‘go down every night on my knees and thank God that Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal were born because they have carried this sport’’. Moore later quit. TIMES be the