Executive Committee member Novak Djokovic and Executive Director Ahmad Nassar recently sat down to discuss betting and data in tennis and how it impacts players.
Novak and Ahmad highlighted how under tennis’ current rules, players are prevented from engaging with betting companies but other stakeholders are allowed to earn major revenue from this booming industry with no revenue share with the players. Novak emphasized that in his opinion, players should earn at least 50% of the revenues generated from such deals.
“Because of the integrity of the sport, we are not allowed as players to put any of the betting companies’ patches on our clothes while we’re playing on the court, and we do not get a fair share. When I say fair share, I mean 50-50 at least with tournaments that are allowed, on the other hand, to have the major sponsors from the betting world. That’s as simple as it gets and for me it’s completely unacceptable.”
Ahmad also highlighted how in other major sports, even if players are prevented from working with betting companies, they can still take comfort in the fact that they will benefit from betting and data deals through their sport’s overall revenue share with players. More money invested into the sport’s ecosystem will trickle down to players’ pockets through the revenue share, but in tennis no such revenue share exists.
In addition, Novak discussed that while a percentage of sports betting and player data revenues go toward the ATP’s player pension program, not all players will become eligible for pension and those players who are eligible will still wait decades to access any of that money.
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