With careers spent scratching around dusty outposts, sometimes with “just $100” in their pockets, tennis’ unheralded army of foot soldiers claim they are struggling to afford food after being made unemployed overnight by the coronavirus pandemic.
Now, Georgian player Sofia Shapatava is pleading with the International Tennis Federation (ITF) to dig deep and help out the hundreds of players who lost their livelihoods when the men’s and women’s tours went into a three-month lockdown.
“Players ranked lower than 250 will not be able to buy food in two-three weeks’ time,” warned Shapatava, who is not optimistic the ITF will look favourably on her plea.
“I honestly don’t think so,” she said. “They replied that their plate is full and they will come back to me as soon as they can. But after that email, they did not reply with anything.” Shapatava, the world No. 371, is a 16-year veteran of the tour.
But she plays mostly secondary ITF events, a world away from the gilded Grand Slam world inhabited by multi-millionaires Serena Williams, Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal. Shapatava has banked $354,000 in career prize money from almost 1,500 singles and doubles matches. Barely $3,000 has come her way since the turn of the year.
However, compared to many, the 31-year-old is well-off. There are comfortably over 1,000 players in the WTA rankings. The men’s ATP Tour has just as many. Amongst a batch of women currently locked in the lowest rank of 1,283 is 27-year-old Ksenia Kolesnikova of Russia. In 2020, she has officially made just $68.
Many players outside the lucrative top 100 traditionally supplement their meagre incomes by coaching or playing in European club leagues. However, those reliable revenue streams dried up after governments worldwide banned large gatherings to combat the spread of coronavirus.
“I started the petition to help tennis players to be heard by ITF, after I talked to many of the people I know and about their plans for the next three months and I realised that some people won’t even be able to have food,” Shapatava claimed in her online blog.
“My problem is that my sport will die as it is, it will die, because players who are ranked lower than 150 in the world will not be able to play.”
Coronavirus has brought all tennis to a standstill until June 8 at the earliest.
The entire claycourt season has been wiped out with the French Open shifted to September-October. Wimbledon could follow suit next week when organisers may postpone or even cancel the Grand Slam event.
Britain’s Tara Moore, the world No. 233, has made just $2,500 this year but her career earnings stand at $473,500, boosted by lucrative wildcards into the main draw at Wimbledon. In 2016, she made the second round at the All England Club and pocketed a welcome $62,000.
“There are more important things like life and death, but a lot of players from smaller countries, (are) unable to earn any income, unable to claim benefits as they are considered ‘self-employed’,” wrote Moore. “It will be tough for many players to survive the next couple of months.” Agencies
