Novak Djokovic v Serena Williams fight in battle of the sexes tennis pentahlon
Would women tennis players earn the same as men if there were two tours separated by gender? Would you pay more to see the men or the women? Should men and women always earn the same for the same job? While the world’s female supermodels march for equal pay for male models, the Telegraph has news:
Novak Djokovic, tennis world number one, said he believed men should be awarded more prize money than women as their matches have more viewers. He made his comments after winning the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells on Sunday and defended the use of viewing statistics to determine prize money. Earlier the event’s chief executive, Raymond Moore, provoked controversy ahead of the final between Victoria Azarenka and Serena Williams by saying the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) was a “lucky organisation” which “rides on the coattails” of the men.
Would women’s footballers earn pay closer to the men if their matches were played as part of the same tournament? Says Novak:
“Obviously it’s a very delicate situation. Women deserve respect and admiration for what they are doing. You know, equal prize money was the main subject of the tennis world in the last seven, eight years. I have been through that process as well so I understand how much power and energy WTA and all the advocates for equal prize money have invested in order to reach that.
“I applaud them for that, I honestly do. They fought for what they deserve and they got it. On the other hand I think that our men’s tennis world, ATP world, should fight for more because the stats are showing that we have much more spectators on the men’s tennis matches. I think that’s one of the reasons why maybe we should get awarded more. Women should fight for what they think they deserve and we should fight for what we think we deserve.
“As long as it’s like that and there is data and stats available upon who attracts more attention, spectators, who sells more tickets and stuff like that, in relation to that it has to be fairly distributed.”
What we need is for the game’s stars to go head-to-head. Serena Williams v Novak Djokovic in a tennis pentathlon, taking in such key elements of the game as: grunting (duration and volume); watch-size put on just before the trophy lifting (which has the biggest face and heft?); lemon barley water speed drinking; banana peeling; duration of post-final speech.
New balls, please.
Posted: 21st, March 2016 | In: Back pages, Sports Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
