WHEN WIMBLEDON DECIDED TO GO PRO
It was all change for the All England Club 50 years ago, when professional tennis players were allowed to compete for the first time. MARION McMULLEN looks at the historic turning point
IT WAS the year Australian tennis star Rod Laver and America’s Billie Jean King were crowned the champions of Wimbledon.
Rod, returning to the All England Club in 1968 following a five-year absence after turning professional, picked up £2,000 from a total tournament prize fund of £26,150 for winning his third men’s singles title.
Women’s winner Billie Jean King had to settle for just £750, but later said: “I was always in the tennis business – from 1968. I was in tournaments and also on World Team Tennis teams as well.”
The Ladies’ Championship was a triumph for Billie Jean, who won for a third year running. She also secured the ladies’ doubles with Rosemary Casals.
The prize money then is small change compared to the £2.25m each of the singles winners of Wimbledon 2018 will pocket – out of a tournament prize fund of £34m – but it was the relatively low-key initiation in 1968 which paved the way for such an abundance of riches.
Fifty years ago Wimbledon defied the wishes of the International Lawn Tennis Federation and ushered in a lucrative new era of professional grand slam tennis with the first Open Wimbledon.
The ITF had resolutely refused to let professional players compete in grand slams, leading to an increasing number of top players pursuing their own rival tour.
But members of the Lawn Tennis Association, among others, recognised that the situation was unsustainable.
Announcing Wimbledon’s historic decision to allow professionals for the first time, the LTA’s Derek Penman said: “We must take action on our own account to make the game honest.
“For too long now we have been governed by a set of amateur rules that are quite unenforceable.”
Wimbledon 1968 became the second grand slam tournament, after the French Open that year, to permit professionals, although there were frequent boycotts in the next few years by professionals who did not consider the prize money sufficient.
However, it was a groundbreaking move for Wimbledon and saw the return of Pancho Gonzales, who had not played at the tournament since 1949, and also attracted tennis stars like Lew Hoad, Ken Rosewall, Pancho Segura, Andres Gimeno and Butch Buchholz.
Rod Laver beat fellow Australian Tony Roche in straight sets in the men’s singles final to underline his status as the world’s best player.
He won having come through a difficult match in the fourth round against Britain’s Mark Cox, who took a set off the Australian before folding.
The final, between two left handers, saw Rod win Wimbledon’s first open tournament 6-3, 6-4, 6-2.
Billie Jean King picked up her third consecutive title with a win over Judy Tegart. The American player beat British fourth seed Ann Jones in the quarter-finals and young fifth seed Virginia Wade suffered a shock first round exit to Christina Sandberg.
There were also changes on the fashion front. It seemed back in 1968 that the wizard of Wimbledon fashions, Teddy Tinling, had finally been tamed. Colonel Tinling had been well known in the best-dressed tennis circles since he first popped Gorgeous Gussie Moran into a pair of lace bloomers in 1949, and over the years had come up with seethrough plastic midriffs, red tights and shocking pink panties for female tennis players.
In 1968, he offered a more traditional tennis look. Italy’s Lea Pericoli sported one of his simple white skirts while British Number 1 Ann Jones and Brazil’s Maria Bueno wore tennis frocks decorated with strips of computer data.
But it was the changes on the court
that marked a major breakthrough for the sport – although its top stars still had to be patient when it came to prize money.
It was another six years until the men’s Wimbledon champion would take home a five-figure sum, while the women’s winner had to wait two further years.
Billie Jean King and Rod Laver, who are now 74 and 79, have 59 Grand Slam titles between them and are the ‘chairman’s special guests’ at Wimbledon this year.
Rod was also appointed Companion of the Order of Australia, one of the nation’s highest honours, during the Australian Open two years ago.
He recently said that winning Wimbledon had been his dream since he started playing tennis and he achieved that victory four times.
The Australian tennis legend once said: “The time your game is most vulnerable is when you’re ahead; never let up.”