Three-time Wimbledon champion John McEnroe has weighed in on two of the Championship’s most recent controversies – the removal of line judges and players striking over prize money.
The American has been a fixture of the BBC’s broadcast team at the grass court Grand Slam for years and remains a key part of the “most comprehensive” coverage of the tournament ever.
The decision to remove line judges proved divisive last year but the All England Club has doubled down, adding improvements to the automated electronic line calling system.
McEnroe was known for his explosive on-court behaviour in SW19, particularly relating to line calls, and was quizzed on whether he missed them.
“Well, you know, that is a loaded question,” he said. “Perhaps, I wouldn’t be, for better or for worse, known in a certain way – even though I think I was pretty good at tennis – because of all the things that went on over the years.
“So I guess in that sense I would miss it, but I don’t miss the idea of the correct call being made, and I don’t think any athlete or player would. Look at the World Cup, at any sporting event, and you want the correct call to be made, not a mistake causing a change in the outcome.
“From that standpoint it seems like the players have accepted it and have one less thing to worry about. I’ll speak for myself – you get this thing in your head, you’re making it up, as if these umpires, who aren’t the highest paid people, are going in there to screw McEnroe. That’s their plan.
“Even at the worst of my behaviour, I don’t think they were doing that, but I got myself believing it in a way, so I suppose that if you get that out of your head as a player and you think, ‘OK we’re on a level playing field’, that’s a good thing.”
That’s not the only controversy to hit Wimbledon recently. In 2026, players are limiting their media duties in protest over Grand Slam prize money.
Despite a 20 per cent increase in prize money for this year’s tournament, the players remain frustrated as they believe a higher proportion of the top tournaments’ revenue should be allocated to prize money.
“My sympathies are more with the players,” said McEnroe. “But this is not something that is a new issue. We were dealing with this when I first broke onto the scene.
“The revenue share has been very unfair. Now, listen, if you had told me that I’d be getting £3.6 million when I won Wimbledon. I’d be like, ‘Oh my god, this is amazing’. The prize money has certainly gone up, but I think that that money should be shared more.
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“We don’t have a union, that’s a whole other issue. We have an association. I don’t want to get into the nuances of that right now. We don’t have enough time in the day, but to me, that money could be used.
“We always talk about how many players should you support. We could perhaps support more players coming out of college or younger kids, so that they could try to make it on the pro tour, and players that never got anything at all, older players.
“I’m hopeful that there’ll be some type of positive resolution. I’m not confident, because I believe that the only way that players will actually get their fair share – and I hate to say this, because it’s easy for me to say now I’m an old man – is boycotting a major event or two. That’s the only way things are going to change.”
Wimbledon is live every day on BBC One and BBC Two, with extensive coverage on red button, BBC iPlayer and the BBC Sport website, until the men’s final on Sunday 19 July.
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