Issues of gender equity and equal prize money may be roiling tennis (and other sports), but ask Chris Kermode, president and executive chairman of the ATP World Tour about it, and he claims no position.
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“I don’t need to even express an opinion … I don’t run the women’s tour,” Kermode said.
Photo by: GETTY IMAGES
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“I don’t need to even express an opinion about what women should get paid because I don’t run the women’s tour,” he said. “What the promoters [and tourney directors] do for the WTA is none of my business.”
The ATP operates 62 events, 13 of which are combined with WTA events. Of those combined events, three have equal prize money; three have higher prize money for women than men, because the event ranks higher on the WTA calendar than it does on the ATP slate; and the other seven have more money for men.
Tennis’s Grand Slam events operate separately from the tours. All four of those events have equal prize money for men and women.
Despite his stated neutrality, the pay issue did spill into Kermode’s lap in late 2014, when tournament directors opposing player demands for high purses contended that would mean the events would have to raise prize money for the women. Kermode, who successfully sided with the players, said it is a tournament director’s decision to combine an event with the WTA and also, therefore, that director’s decision on whether that means commensurate pay.
“It is as simple as that,” he said.
Meanwhile, Kermode is focusing his energies on a review of the ATP structure, a process that began last month and should last through the end of 2017. The tour is working to hire a company to conduct focus groups around the world to gauge fan opinion on everything from the look of the game on TV to whether there are too many, or too few, tournaments. The focus group company is Canadian, Kermode said, but he declined to name the company because a contract had not yet been signed.
