Djokovic during a video conference to discuss the Professional Tennis Players Association (PTPA) on Friday night, just before three days before the start of Wimbledon, where he will be seeking a 20th Grand Slam title, said he has been speaking to top female tennis pros, including Serena Williams, about the players’ association that he and Vasek Pospisil founded in the hopes of gaining “more access and more transparency” — and a larger cut of the sport’s revenues.
“You start to realize that the players are not represented in the way that they deserve and in the way they should be,” he added.
Djokovic continued “I feel like many players are figuring out,” he added, “that we need to do something more than just trying to be satisfied with the little information that we are getting.” Tennis players are not represented by a union the way athletes in North American team sports are; instead, each player is considered an independent contractor.
“There are a lot of very, very, I would say, unhappy players, and players that are struggling – Djokovic
“Tennis is far behind, I think. We’re in 2021 and this is just … a fundamental need for our sport in the world that we live in,” Pospisil said. “There are a lot of very, very, I would say, unhappy players, and players that are struggling, and I don’t think that needs to be the case.” The No. 1-ranked Djokovic and Pospisil, who won the 2014 Wimbledon men’s doubles title and is currently No. 66 in singles, launched the PTPA around the time of last year’s U.S. Open in August.
