Precisely during the farewell of his colleague Vesnina, the former number 3 in the ranking blurts out: “Women are on the court less and never play five-set matches. Serena Williams has won tournaments without even breaking a sweat…”
Former world number three Nikolay Davydenko enters straight into the endless diatribe of prize money for men and women in tennis and the differences that sometimes exist or not. According to the Russian, 43 years old and retired for a long time now, those who play on the women’s circuit would not have the right to earn their male colleagues. Therefore, no equality, because, according to the winner of 21 tournaments including the 2009 Masters, “men work and are on the field much more than women, it is not right to pay them the same”.
goodbye to tennis
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Davydenko, who among other things expressed the concept during the farewell to tennis of one of his colleagues (Elena Vesnina), explained his point of view: “In the 250, 500, 1000 category tournaments it is possible that there are the same prizes, in those cases I can also understand it – said the Russian -. But when we talk about slam tournaments, things change, it’s completely different. Women never play five-set matches, they don’t play for that long.” And again: “For example, Serena Williams, for example, during her career won certain slam tournaments, losing only 10 games during the entire tournament. Not in just one match, I mean in the whole tournament! He won so many sets 6-0 or 6-1 without even breaking a sweat or expending energy, such was his dominance. This never happens among men – continued the former world number three – There are players who lose 10 games in just the first match, when things go well, sometimes you go to the fifth set in the first round and then maybe you lose, playing for of hours. You can’t pay women and men the same for this very reason.” Words, those of Davydenko, which will certainly cause discussion and which are a bit out of tune with the direction that the world of tennis is taking precisely on this point of view.