“New and groundbreaking”
Maternity protection: revolution in women’s tennis
07.03.2025 – 00:20 a.m.Reading time: 1 min.
So far, pregnancy for tennis players has been associated with high financial losses. This should change now. The WTA presented a program.
In women’s tennis, there is now maternity leave paid for up to a year. The professional organization WTA announced a program financed by the Saudi Arabian investment fund PIF that supports tennis players during and after pregnancy. There should also be access to the desire to have children. The WTA on the edge of the Master tournament in Indian Wells did not say how high the financial support is and which prerequisites have to be met in order to benefit from it.
According to the WTA, more than 300 players are qualified, the funding program applies retrospectively to January 1. “Freelanders and self-employed usually have no access to this type of maternity protection. You somehow have to regulate it yourself,” said WTA managing director Portia Archer. “This is new and groundbreaking.”
In recent years there have been increasing players who have come back on the tour after pregnancy and continued their careers as tennis professionals-such as the former German number one Angelique Kerber in front of their final career end or the former world-class players Serena Williams, Naomi Osaka and Kim Clijsters.
The Saudi fund pif has recently invested vigorously in tennis. The sporty, meaningless show tournament Six Kings Slam in Riad caused $ 1.5 million each causing a sensation due to the climbing premium. In Saudi Arabia, the WTA finals of the eight best tennis players took place for the first time last year. Human rights organizations criticize Saudi Arabia to want to distract from the difficult human rights situation in the country with so-called sports water.