Latest news with #GrandSlams'
Irish Independent
06-08-2025
- Business
- Irish Independent
‘I made €247,000 in tennis... so not a lot': Conor Niland on the true cost of competitive sport
It's the number that stops Conor Niland in his tracks, the same number that represents his career high rank in the incredibly competitive – and potentially extremely lucrative – world of tennis. Today, Niland (43) works in commercial property, in addition to recently becoming a celebrated author – his memoir The Racket won the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award in 2024. 'I started in commercial property at 31, 32… All that stuff was new to me. Everything about the working world – even the office printer and scanner – was new to me,' he tells Katie Byrne on the latest episode of the Money Talks podcast. 'I didn't know any of that stuff. I'd never had to do it. Writing emails to clients, calls in an open-plan office… You know, with your boss not listening in but obviously sitting beside you and can't not listen.' Niland also gives listeners an insight into prize money and the highest-paid players in tennis. 'We have billionaires in our sport,' he says. 'The likes of Roger Federer and Serena Williams, who are able to earn incredible money after they finish their [careers]. True sporting icons, not just tennis icons. 'But then, obviously, you have this big pyramid or bottleneck in tennis where you've got the very, very tip who are earning an awful lot of money and then it goes quite quickly to a very wide base of players who are really struggling to make ends meet and make money week to week.' During his career, Niland earned approximately €247,000 over the course of seven or eight years. 'Not a lot of money', he notes, while speaking candidly about his decision to call time on his playing career at a young age. 'I definitely reconciled with myself at a certain period of my career that I was unlikely to be coming out of this with a pension and a nest egg and an awful lot of money. 'When I was hitting 27, 28 years of age my goal became 'I want to play in the Grand Slams' so I can give myself context and achieve a dream. 'And I was getting to a point where my career was washing its own face – at #150 in the world, #200 in the world, I was sort of making, give or take, what I was spending, with a little bit of help from various quarters. That made it a lot easier – but then, it's no coincidence that I stopped playing at 30 years of age.' You can listen to stories from Niland's days on the court as well as how he successfully transitioned away from the sport and into a more traditional nine-to-five role on the latest episode of Money Talks or wherever you get your podcasts.
Irish Independent
06-08-2025
- Business
- Irish Independent
Conor Niland: ‘In tennis, you can be talking €100,000+ in yearly expenses'
It's the number that stops Conor Niland in his tracks, the same number that represents his career high rank in the incredibly competitive – and potentially extremely lucrative – world of tennis. Today, Niland (43) works in commercial property, in addition to recently becoming a celebrated author – his memoir The Racket won the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award in 2024. 'I started in commercial property at 31, 32… All that stuff was new to me. Everything about the working world – even the office printer and scanner – was new to me,' he tells Katie Byrne on the latest episode of the Money Talks podcast. 'I didn't know any of that stuff. I'd never had to do it. Writing emails to clients, calls in an open-plan office… You know, with your boss not listening in but obviously sitting beside you and can't not listen.' Niland also gives listeners an insight into prize money and the highest-paid players in tennis. 'We have billionaires in our sport,' he says. 'The likes of Roger Federer and Serena Williams, who are able to earn incredible money after they finish their [careers]. True sporting icons, not just tennis icons. 'But then, obviously, you have this big pyramid or bottleneck in tennis where you've got the very, very tip who are earning an awful lot of money and then it goes quite quickly to a very wide base of players who are really struggling to make ends meet and make money week to week.' During his career, Niland earned approximately €247,000 over the course of seven or eight years. 'Not a lot of money', he notes, while speaking candidly about his decision to call time on his playing career at a young age. 'I definitely reconciled with myself at a certain period of my career that I was unlikely to be coming out of this with a pension and a nest egg and an awful lot of money. 'When I was hitting 27, 28 years of age my goal became 'I want to play in the Grand Slams' so I can give myself context and achieve a dream. 'And I was getting to a point where my career was washing its own face – at #150 in the world, #200 in the world, I was sort of making, give or take, what I was spending, with a little bit of help from various quarters. That made it a lot easier – but then, it's no coincidence that I stopped playing at 30 years of age.' You can listen to stories from Niland's days on the court as well as how he successfully transitioned away from the sport and into a more traditional nine-to-five role on the latest episode of Money Talks or wherever you get your podcasts.
Irish Independent
06-08-2025
- Business
- Irish Independent
Money Talks: ‘Everything about the working world – even the printer – was new to me': Tennis pro Conor Niland on his transition to an office 9-5
It's the number that stops Conor Niland in his tracks, the same number that represents his career high rank in the incredibly competitive – and potentially extremely lucrative – world of tennis. Today, Niland (43) works in commercial property, in addition to recently becoming a celebrated author – his memoir The Racket won the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award in 2024. 'I started in commercial property at 31, 32… All that stuff was new to me. Everything about the working world – even the office printer and scanner – was new to me,' he tells Katie Byrne on the latest episode of the Money Talks podcast. 'I didn't know any of that stuff. I'd never had to do it. Writing emails to clients, calls in an open-plan office… You know, with your boss not listening in but obviously sitting beside you and can't not listen.' Niland also gives listeners an insight into prize money and the highest-paid players in tennis. 'We have billionaires in our sport,' he says. 'The likes of Roger Federer and Serena Williams, who are able to earn incredible money after they finish their [careers]. True sporting icons, not just tennis icons. 'But then, obviously, you have this big pyramid or bottleneck in tennis where you've got the very, very tip who are earning an awful lot of money and then it goes quite quickly to a very wide base of players who are really struggling to make ends meet and make money week to week.' During his career, Niland earned approximately €247,000 over the course of seven or eight years. 'Not a lot of money', he notes, while speaking candidly about his decision to call time on his playing career at a young age. 'I definitely reconciled with myself at a certain period of my career that I was unlikely to be coming out of this with a pension and a nest egg and an awful lot of money. 'When I was hitting 27, 28 years of age my goal became 'I want to play in the Grand Slams' so I can give myself context and achieve a dream. 'And I was getting to a point where my career was washing its own face – at #150 in the world, #200 in the world, I was sort of making, give or take, what I was spending, with a little bit of help from various quarters. That made it a lot easier – but then, it's no coincidence that I stopped playing at 30 years of age.' You can listen to stories from Niland's days on the court as well as how he successfully transitioned away from the sport and into a more traditional nine-to-five role on the latest episode of Money Talks or wherever you get your podcasts.
New York Times
21-03-2025
- Business
- New York Times
Tennis' Grand Slams reject new ATP and WTA plan for the sport's calendar and finances
After mulling a proposal from the leaders of the men's and women's tennis tours to restructure the sport, the people in charge of the four Grand Slams have sent back a terse rejection that leaves the sport's future in a state of paralysis. 'Whilst we appreciate the time and effort you have put in to articulating your position, it fails to adequately address the essential issues we have repeatedly raised,' a one-page, eight-paragraph letter, sent to the chairmen of the men's ATP and women's WTA Tours and reviewed by The Athletic, said. Advertisement On March 16, Andrea Gaudenzi, the ATP chair, and Steve Simon, his counterpart on the WTA, sent Wimbledon and the Australian, French and U.S. Opens a 23-page deck. It outlined a new governing structure for tennis, a streamlined calendar of tournaments, improved pay for the players and a plan to fund it all. The leaders of the Grand Slams sent their response hours after The Athletic reported the contents of Gaudenzi's and Simon's proposal. A representative of the men's tour, which would prefer to begin governing the sport with the Grand Slams and then figure out the schedule, declined to comment. A representative of the women's tour did not respond to a request for comment. 'We share your disappointment that more progress has not been made in addressing the significant long-term challenges and opportunities facing professional tennis,' the letter said. It then reasserted the Grand Slams' desire to pursue an even more streamlined calendar of elite tournaments, in a bid to attract more fans and sponsors to bring more money into the sport. That product — centered on their four tournaments and ten further events on the men's and women's side per year — was at the center of the 'premium tour' that the Grand Slams proposed to the ATP and WTA last year. It never went further than discussions. The tours' new proposal includes that structure, which would rely on the ATP and WTA 1,000 events, named for the ranking points they award to their winners. But it also includes 16 ATP 500 and 17 WTA 500 tournaments, as well as an undisclosed number of 250-level tournaments. The Grand Slams see this as flying in the face of creating a less-muddled and taxing schedule that they believe will be easier for fans to follow (and will give their events even more primacy). They added that it does not permit an off-season long enough to allow players to recover properly; they are pushing for that downtime to be eight weeks. Advertisement 'This is not a speculative position – it is grounded in solid, data-driven analysis which we have all gone through together,' the letter states. The back-and-forth comes at a fraught time for tennis. On, Tuesday, the Professional Tennis Players Association (PTPA), the organization co-founded by 24-time Grand Slam champion Novak Djokovic, labeled the biggest governing bodies in tennis as a 'cartel' which suppresses wages, player opportunity and rival tournaments 'to the harm of players and fans alike,' in an antitrust lawsuit filed in New York City, London and Brussels. The organization named the men's ATP and women's WTA tours, the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) as defendants, threatens to overturn the fundamental structure of one of the most popular global sports. The tours and the Grand Slams have spent most of the past year speaking several times a month. Now it appears they are as far apart as ever. 'The change needed in our sport must begin with a vision for bold and concrete product reform,' the Grand Slams' letter said. 'Until you feel able to commit to a vision and a plan with respect to these core issues it is difficult to see how our discussions can continue. Should your position change, our door remains open.'
New York Times
20-03-2025
- Business
- New York Times
Tennis leaders of ATP and WTA Tours present the Grand Slams with a new plan to fix the sport
In April 2024, the four biggest tournaments in tennis, the Grand Slams, presented a plan to restructure the sport. Dubbed the 'premium tour,' it included Wimbledon and the Australian, French and U.S. Opens, alongside ten more top-level tournaments run through the ATP (men's) and WTA (women's) tours. It included doubling prize money for the top 300 men; quadrupling it for the top 300 women and accelerating equal pay across all events, funded through a partial pooling of the Grand Slams' lucrative media rights. Advertisement It never went much further. But just under a year later, the tours have played a Uno reverse card by presenting the Grand Slams with a plan of their own. Andrea Gaudenzi, the chairman of the men's ATP Tour, and Steve Simon, his counterpart at the WTA Tour, last week presented a 23-page deck to the four Grand Slams, just as the Professional Tennis Players Association (PTPA) was finalizing the antitrust lawsuit that it filed Tuesday March 18 against the tours and other tennis governing bodies. That lawsuit, with player plaintiffs named alongside the PTPA, labeled the four Grand Slams as 'co-conspirators' in a series of alleged anticompetitive practices, from prize money suppression to excluding exhibition events from the tennis world rankings. Facing a revolt from the sport's nascent player organization, the leaders of the men's and women's tennis tours have joined forces to try to bring its long-battling factions — the ATP and WTA, the four Grand Slams, and the owners of the other top tournaments — under one giant governing and corporate umbrella. The ATP and WTA deck focuses on the areas that nearly all parties agree on. Tennis' fragmented structure weakens its ability to sell media rights and sponsorships; the season is too long and too disparate; the sport's infrastructure does not financially support enough players sufficiently. Its substance is familiar. Four Grand Slams. Ten top-level mixed events. A pooling of media rights and sponsorship revenues to fund it all. And a new board structure that would oversee sporting matters, with representatives for the Grand Slams, the tournaments and ATP and WTA players. 'It all starts with top players at premium events — driving rivalries and elevating the sport's biggest stages,' the deck says. The owners of the 1,000, 500, and 250-level tournaments below Grand Slams, named for the ranking points they award to their winners, have not been included in the proposal's formation. The deck proposes a calendar structured as follows: The inclusion of the 500s and some 250s is a significant diversion from the Grand Slams' plan, which proposed incorporating those tournaments into a developmental tour, through which players would ascend to the 'premium' tour. The calendar also promises 'improved regional flow' and an 'extended off season,' but does not discuss specifics. Advertisement The sporting structure would be overseen by a new board. There would be three representatives for the four Grand Slams; two reps for the 1,000 tournaments and one rep with the responsibility of representing 500 and 250 tournaments simultaneously. The International Tennis Federation, the world governing body that oversees national team tournaments and the Olympic competition, is not included. There would be six player seats, three for the ATP and three for the WTA, with one chair. The deck uses photos of top players, including Novak Djokovic, who is on the PTPA executive committee, and Iga Swiatek and Carlos Alcaraz, who have recently criticized the tournament schedule and the number of mandatory events that players have to play. The organizations that run the four majors were contacted for comment. None of them responded prior to publication of this story. Like Gaudenzi and Simon, the Grand Slams are frustrated and disappointed with the lack of progress toward reform, according to a person involved with one of the four organizations who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. The person said the proposal from Simon and Gaudenzi had been received and in their view did not go far enough. The Slams' priorities for change, they said, would focus on a premium product with fewer tournaments and a substantially longer off-season. Another person who has been in contact with the Grand Slams, who also was not authorized to disclose confidential discussions, said the idea that the four Grand Slams might only receive three seats on the board was not well-received. A third person briefed on Simon and Gaudenzi's proposal said the proposed construction of the board was aimed at balancing representation while keeping the board from getting too large. Tennis' annual revenue exceeds $2.2 billion (£1.7m) but its sources are split, both by who brings it in and how. The Grand Slams' proportion of that revenue (over 50 percent) dwarfs that of the ATP (over 30) and WTA Tour (under 10), largely thanks to their more lucrative media rights and the sponsorships that come with it, as well as the volume of tickets they can sell to fans who want to see the best players in the world. Advertisement Go further down the rungs of tournament prestige and revenue drops while its proportions change; the less lucrative the tournament, the lower the proportion of revenue that comes from media and sponsorships. The split revenues also harm the various bodies' negotiating positions in media rights, because they are effectively competing against each other. Selling one package would maximize competition from bidders and so, the theory goes, drive up the price. Gaudenzi and Simon's solution is what the deck calls 'commercial aggregation.' In practice means incorporating a company called Tennis Ventures which would include the commercial interests of the ATP, WTA and the four Slams. The deck says that the Slams would retain control over their domestic media rights, but international media rights — and data and streaming rights — would be packaged. The streaming piece could be critical, as sports media faces a contraction in the value of traditional television rights and contracts come up for renewal. A united company of this kind has been a key plan for the ATP and WTA, but any merger between the two organizations has yet to be finalized. Adding the Grand Slams would require their willingness to give up some of the power attached to their media rights. Thus far the Grand Slams have struggled to agree on how they might one day share their lucrative rights solely with each other. On the remuneration side of things, the ATP and WTA pledge to 'give players their fair share.' They say this will be achieved by creating 'a profit-sharing model where players and tournaments share in new value created.' The proportion of revenue that players get from the tournaments in which they play was a major issue outlined in the PTPA's lawsuit. Prize money at the four Grand Slams is around 15 to 20 percent of their revenue, with similar figures at ATP and WTA 1,000, 500 and 250 events. In other major sports, including the NBA, NFL, MLB and even another individual sport such as golf, that proportion gets as high as roughly 50 percent. One of the major ways the proposal says it will increase player revenues is through bringing the Grand Slams into the 'bonus pool,' which already exists on the ATP Tour for 1,000-level events. Per the ATP, the 'collective profits generated by the tournaments above on-site prize money' are split 50-50 between the event in question and the players. There is a separate bonus pool for the best-performing players at ATP 500 events. Advertisement Adding a bonus pool from the much more lucrative Grand Slams would make a significant financial difference, and the majors have also been asked to contribute to player welfare initiatives and the circuits that sit below the main ATP and WTA tours. 'This is ultimately about creating a sustainable ecosystem,' Gaudenzi and Simon state in the document. 'Where players have transparency over the financials. Where your wins are their wins. 'Getting us away from the endless cycle of negotiations and strained relationships, to a place where players are working with you as vested partners.' Such a system would rely on the Grand Slams sacrificing some of their financial power for what the tours frame as the greater good. (Top photo of Andrea Gaudenzi and Jannik Sinner: Marco Canoniero / LightRocket via Getty Images)
