Chronicle EditorLONDON. — Prize money for players who lose in the first three rounds at this year’s Wimbledon Tennis Championships has risen by over 100 percent over a three-year period.
The overall prize fund has increased by 10.8 percent to £25m, with first round losers seeing their reward rise from £11 500 in 2011 to £27 000 in 2014.All England Lawn Tennis Club chief executive Richard Lewis said: “I’m not saying they are pleading poverty. “But they aren’t making huge sums of money for world-class sportsmen.”
AELTC chairman Philip Brook told BBC Sport: “We have been conscious of the fact that we have many players coming to Wimbledon who are making their way on the professional circuit looking to reach the top echelons of the sport.
“It is a very long and a very expensive road on which to travel, and we’ve felt for the last two or three years that we need to do more to help these players on that journey.” — BBC Sport.
Online Reporter