Kafelnikov hits out in pay row

Chris Jones13 April 2012

Olympic champion Yevgeny Kafelnikov, who has amassed career earnings of more than £11 million, today hit out at the "ludicrously" small prize money on offer to top tennis players.

Kafelnikov, the 1999 Australian Open champion and runner-up last year, made his contentious comments "on behalf of other players who cannot say stuff like this".

The Russian superstar, who earned £2.5m on court last year, is always ready to speak his mind and last year savaged the London Indoor tournament and the players' hotel used in the Docklands - the event has now left London.

His attack on the men's prize money fund will amaze many as he already has an enviable lifestyle, featuring private jet travel plus free accommodation and transport when he is at tournaments.

After battling through to the third round of the Australian Open here with a three-hour, seven-minute 6-2, 3-6, 3-6, 6-3, 6-0 win over Nicolas Kiefer, of Germany, the fifth seed guaranteed himself at least £12,800. The eventual winner's cheque is worth £369,000 after seven matches.

He said: "The money on the ATP Tour is ridiculous compared to what other athletes are making. I've been on court for three hours today and when you look at the prize money cheque after the tournament it's quite ridiculous.

"If you look at the professional golfers - an extreme example - they can make £346,000 a week for the winner and that is the lowest on the US Tour!

"Tennis players must win five matches and at the lowest level of tournament on the circuit you make only £27,000. I think that it is quite bizarre to see that kind of money in a tennis game.

"I am not talking about this from my point of view, I am talking on behalf of other players. You know, some of the players just don't say things like this and I guess I am in the position where I can say stuff like this.

"A lot of guys would defend my opinion, but it would be a shame to see the public lose sympathy because of the statements I have made."

Kafelnikov admitted he could have lost today's clash with Kiefer "three or four years ago" because he felt so frustrated in the fourth set.

It took an explosion of anger, which earned him an official warning for ball abuse, to get him back into the right frame of mind.

Meanwhile, seventh seed Lleyton Hewitt dragged himself back from the brink of disaster to beat Germany's Tommy Haas 7-5, 7-6, 6-4 and book his place in the third round of the Australian Open.

Hewitt was 5-0 down and had a set point against him in the first set when he staged an amazing revival to take it 7-5. But then he was 4-1 down with a break point against him in the next before winning it on the tie-break 7-6. He won the third from 4-2 down.

Hewitt said: "Thank God I got out of that first set. I flew in a guy from Adelaide to help with my hamstring injury and I was feeling good and ready for the next set and by fighting it out, I was able to win today. I have beaten Jonas Bjorkman and Haas and now it's Carlos Moya - it doesn't get any easier!"

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT