LTA commits to paying equal prize cash to girls at Queen’s and Eastbourne tournaments by 2029 | Tennis Information

The Garden Tennis Affiliation has dedicated to paying equal prize cash to feminine gamers at Queen’s and Eastbourne by 2029.

Ladies will play at Queen’s Membership subsequent week for the primary time in additional than 50 years on the inaugural HSBC Championships, that includes the likes of Emma Raducanu, Katie Boulter and top-10 stars Madison Keys and Zheng Qinwen.

The LTA introduced on Thursday it might pay whole prize cash of $1.415m (roughly £1m), the very best for a WTA 500 occasion of its draw measurement this 12 months.

However that’s nonetheless lower than half of the prize pot that will probably be paid out to the male gamers the next week for the equal event on the ATP Tour.

On the Lexus Eastbourne Open, a joint WTA and ATP occasion staged the week earlier than Wimbledon starting on June 23, the distinction is even starker, with the ladies’s prize fund of $389,000 (roughly £287,000) considerably inferior to the greater than £630,000 that will probably be paid to the boys.

Whereas prize cash is equal on the grand slams and a few joint tour occasions, usually remuneration on the WTA Tour is considerably decrease than the ATP.

The LTA said an goal to attain parity earlier than 2029 however its rationale comes in opposition to a £4m loss made throughout the grass-court occasions it staged final 12 months – Wimbledon is run by the All England Membership – with the boys’s occasion at Queen’s the one worthwhile event.

Scott Lloyd, the governing physique’s chief govt, mentioned: “We’re making vital will increase this 12 months to the ladies’s prize cash at Queen’s and Eastbourne and need to obtain equal prize cash as quickly as attainable.

“The LTA is dedicated to rising girls’s tennis, each at skilled and grass-roots stage, and this transfer is a vital a part of that dedication.

“This 12 months followers will be capable to take pleasure in each males’s and girls’s tennis on the largest phases that we are able to provide and we need to develop the tournaments in order that the ladies’s occasions ship a path to profitability and higher visibility for the game.”

Ticket gross sales for the ladies’s occasion at Queen’s are at the moment round 80 per cent, with the boys’s event offered out, whereas 55 per cent of these buying WTA tickets have been feminine.

Osaka, Pegula withdraw from Queen’s

4-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka and world No 3 Jessica Pegula have withdrawn from Queen’s.

2024 US Open runner-up Pegula was set to be the very best ranked participant within the draw, however the American withdrew together with Japan’s Osaka on Thursday.

Osaka, whose final main title got here on the 2021 Australian Open, was knocked out within the first spherical of the French Open final week by Paula Badosa.

Pegula reached the fourth spherical in Paris however was upset by Lois Boisson on the French participant’s fairytale run to the final 4.

Watch the ATP and WTA Excursions, in addition to the US Open in New York, reside on Sky Sports activities in 2025 or stream with NOW and the Sky Sports activities app, giving Sky Sports activities clients entry to over 50 per cent extra reside sport this 12 months at no additional value. Discover out extra right here.