Coco Gauff, a 21-year-old American tennis player, excelled this season with many successful moments that marked her year. Coco Gauff seemed to have the potential to finish even at the top of the WTA rankings, but in the women's competition, she managed to finish as world number 3, with a good foundation to improve further next year.
There is more and more talk about equality between women and men in the world of sports, including in the world of tennis. In an interview with Forbes, Coco Gauff highlighted the gap between men's and women's tennis, believing that ATP and WTA should organize joint events.
“And I think the start is for sure targeting the ATP and WTA combined events, because for me there’s no reason we’re both playing two out of three sets, playing at the same venue, and sometimes there are female players like me, Aryna [Sabalenka], Iga [Swiatek], Jess [Pegula], who are selling out some of these stadiums more than some of the other guys and they’re getting paid way more.
So I just think on a fair standpoint that that’s one of the… some combined events have that, but I would like to reach all of that first and then we can work our way down when it comes to 500s and 250 level.
But I think combined events we can look at it objectively, it definitely doesn’t make a lot of sense why the pay gap is that large.”- Gauff said.
The future of tennis
This issue has not only been raised by Coco Gauff, but also by many important figures in women's tennis and legends of the sport. Looking at the direction tennis is heading, and other sports as well, it is certain that the future could be significantly different, with women and men being paid equally.
Critics point out that equality is impossible given that men's tennis attracts significantly more attention and that interest simply determines how much someone will earn.
In recent years, women's tennis has become more and more popular and it seems that this will lead to certain changes.
