Djokovic and Co should just appreciate their good fortune

While the revisiting of the equal-prize-money-in-tennis debate largely prompted a reaction along the lines of ‘ah gawd almighty, not this again’, it did at least help produce the internet’s best moment of the week – the top two headlines on CNN’s website on Monday:

‘S. Korea: North fires projectiles.’

‘Serena Williams fires back.’

A Kim Jong-un missile vs Serena’s forehand? That’d be some rally.

It started, of course, with Indian Wells tournament director Raymond Moore declaring that “if I was a lady player, I’d go down every night on my knees and thank God that Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal were born, because they have carried this sport”.

While a fair chunk of the tennis-loving world might have nodded at this particular assessment, the dropping on your knees bit wasn’t a hugely helpful contribution to the discussion, suggesting that Raymond has more issues with the ladies than just their pay cheques.

And then Novak Djokovic only went and started talking about hormones and you had to check the calendar to be sure it wasn’t 1953.

But in noting that women’s “bodies are much different to men’s bodies” – “they have to go through a lot of different things that we don’t have to go through. You know, the hormones and different stuff, we don’t need to go into details” – Novak actually made a strong, if unintentional, case for the women players being paid more than the boys.

Greater reward

If you’re disadvantaged by hormones and different stuff but still manage to complete a match without bursting in to tears, howling at the umpire for no good reason at all, or needing a lie-down with a hot water bottle between sets, then surely your reward should be great(er)?

Novak apologised in the end, “euphoria and adrenalin after the win on Sunday got the best of me”, he explained (hormones?), but by then he’d already saved a match point by telling us that some of his best friends are women (“I’m surrounded by women. I’m very happy to be married with one”).

He’d had plenty of support, though, before he backed down, like from Ukrainian player Sergiy Stakhovsky (who has a bit of previous – he won’t let his daughter play tennis because almost every female player is gay, apparently – but all the men in the top 100 are roaring heterosexuals, he declared).

Sergiy argued that equal pay in tennis is equivalent to “a law student coming out of Ivy League [earning] the same as a lawyer coming out of any other university”, to which Andy Murray said ‘huh?’ And while they were arguing it out, Serbian player Dusan Lajovic entered the arena to tell Sergiy “I would rather watch Serena eat tacos than you play tennis”.

It’s getting ugly out there.  (And if Awesome Andy isn’t careful, he’ll be called a Feminazi soon).

Serena, meanwhile, humbly suggested, that women players “shouldn’t have to drop to our knees at any point”, and you kind of had to slap yourself in the face and rewind the clip to even believe she had to utter the line.

Considering Novak’s career earnings are said to be around the $48 million mark you’d have thought he’d focus his pay disparity grievances more on the gap between the likes of himself and the lads lower down the rung, rather than fretting about the women’s loot.

Broke even

Fivethirtyeight.com estimated last year that just 336 male professional players (and 253 women) broke even playing tennis, such is the top-heavy nature of the prize money in the sport, meaning a whole bunch of potential Novaks and Serenas have to pack it in before they even get half started.

Gordon Gekko would purr.

If the argument is that sport should bestow greater rewards on those who spend longer completing their sporting activities, then spare a thought for Usain Bolt – he’d be penniless. And cricketers would be able to retire after one Test match. Quantity rarely overrules quality.

But more folk watch men’s tennis! Of course they (largely) do – partly because it’s been a sublime era in men’s tennis, with Djokovic, Federer and Nadal doing their thing, while women’s tennis has been (largely) dominated by one player recently. Cycles. And partly because women’s sport is still in the midst of persuading us couch potatoes that even the hormones and different stuff don’t stop them producing sporting performances of the highly watchable kind.

Inch by inch, getting there.

Djokovic and Co should just appreciate their good fortune, rather than trying to widen the gap between themselves and the rest. They should get down on their knees and be grateful.