Australian tennis player Priscilla Hon has drawn attention to the difference between the men’s and women’s prize money at the Libéma Open in the Netherlands.
The 146th-ranked Hon posted to Instagram about the gap between the men’s winner’s purse of 110,055 euros ($180,214) as opposed to the women’s 32,520 euros ($53,251).
Hon’s caption read: “Same tournament. Same draw. Very different paycheck.”
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She was at pains to explain this was not the fault of the Libéma organisers.
“Before anyone gets mad, I’m just sharing the numbers. This week, a WTA 250 and ATP 250 are running side by side in the same city,” she wrote, before elaborating in the comments,” she wrote.
“Just to be clear this is a system wide issue, not a Libéma Open issue. Just sharing the numbers and starting a conversation.”
The men’s and women’s tournaments in the Dutch city of ‘s-Hertogenbosch are run separately by the ATP and WTA, but both are 250 tournaments — the smallest type of tournament in the top flight of the men’s and women’s tours.
That means the winner receives 250 ranking points, below 500 and 1,000 tournaments as well as the grand slams, where champions receive 2,000.
The majors, governed by the International Tennis Federation, give the same prize money for the men’s and women’s singles victors.
There are three Australian women playing Libéma — Daria Kasatkina, Kimberly Birrell and Ajla Tomljanović.
Sixth-ranked Alex de Minaur is the second seed in the men’s draw, behind world number four Felix Auger-Aliassime.
De Minaur is kicking off his grass court swing at the Dutch tournament after a disappointing stretch on clay, when he won just seven matches from six tournaments, including three Masters 1,000 events and the French Open.
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