Judy calls on Serena & Co to follow her lead
Jcould be left behind. From Billie Jean King to Venus Williams, who was a key figure in securing equal prize money at all the grand slams, female players over the past 50 years have not been afraid to get political.
Murray was one of several to voice exasperation last week when plans to radically transform the Davis Cup made no mention of Fed Cup, a competition in need of reform.
Murray resigned as Great Britain Fed Cup captain two years ago partly because of her frustration at the format, and she said: “I think it needs more of the top women players to push for change on the women’s side.
“On the men’s side, if you’ve got Andy [Murray] and Rafa [Nadal] and Roger [Federer] and Novak [Djokovic] pushing for change, they’re going to sit up and take notice. But we need top women to do the same thing.
“Serena, now that she’s had a baby girl, I’m hoping as she comes towards the end of her career that she will use her voice to make things change for women.”
Having been one of the few elite female coaches in Britain as the head coach of Scotland, in recent years Murray has focused primarily on grassroots and trying to attract more women into tennis.
She made two programmes: Miss Hits, a fun introduction to tennis for girls aged five to eight, and She Rallies, which is growing the female coaching workforce in Britain.
Murray has been banging on the Lawn Tennis Associa- tion’s door for many years and is beginning to see change, with the appointment of Sue Lawrence in October as head of women and girls’ tennis a welcome development.
“Anything that I set up, I’m trying to show the way forward,” said Murray.
“You do get weary of it sometimes because you realise any major change is never going to come down to one person. This is why you need that army around you. It has to come from the top.”