By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Wednesday April 2, 2025
Less than two week after Novak Djokovic’s Professional Tennis Players Association – PTPA – brought a legal suit against the sport’s main governing bodies, the Top 20 players of both tour are also taking up the cause.
In an article published by the French sporting journal L’équipe, it was revealed that the Top 20 players from the ATP and WTA Tour have signed a letter that demands a greater percentage of revenues from the four Grand Slams.
The players are demanding a substantial increase in prize money, citing the fact that they receive a significantly smaller percentage of revenues than other sporting leagues, such as the NBA (reportedly near 50 percent sharing).
L’équipe says that tennis players received about 16 percent of total revenues in total prize money at Roland-Garros last year, for instance.
INFO L’ÉQUIPE. Les représentants du top 20 mondial ATP et WTA ont cosigné et adressé une lettre aux quatre tournois du Grand Chelem, réclamant une augmentation substantielle de leur dotation. Après les actions en justice de la PTPA, la colère monte encore.https://t.co/oqbbrDgFFB
— Quentin Moynet (@QuentinMoynet) April 2, 2025
“I think that that’s going to benefit all the players, not only the top players, especially for those players that work hard during all the years and need to get paid from the Slams, and they have to survive,” Chinq’s Zheng Qinwen, who signed the letter, said today in Charleston. “They also need to pay for a good team to be able to have a good chance to win the match. So I think that’s really positive, because if you look, the basketball sport, they all get paid 50/50.
“I spoke with my manager, and it seems like it’s a positive benefit for all the tennis players. I really believe when you are No. 100 in the world, you need to have a good team to be able to arrive in a higher place. So I think it’s more benefit for those players as well.”
When asked if she thought the Slams would listened to the players, Zheng said:
“I don’t know, We try to do what we can do, and then let’s see what the gods brings to us and the Slams. But at least we are trying.”
