Wimbledon 2019: Miss and Mrs titles scrapped at end of games
- Published
Game, set and match Gauff - The Miss was missing as Venus Williams was defeated by Coco Gauff, 15
Wimbledon 2019 on the BBC |
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Venue: All England Club Dates: 1-14 July |
Coverage: Live across BBC TV, BBC Radio and the BBC Sport website with extensive coverage on BBC iPlayer, Red Button, Connected TVs and mobile app. Full times and channels. |
Centre Court, strawberries and cream ... Wimbledon is famed for tradition but one is now missing - the use of 'Miss' and 'Mrs' at the end of games.
Marital status prefixes for female players have largely been scrapped by tournament organisers to bring parity with the men's game.
That means no more "Game, Miss ..." or "Game, set and match, Mrs..."
"We've got to move with the times," said Alexandra Willis, a spokesperson for the All England Club.
"Hopefully we surprise people with the way we do that."
Watch the moment 15-year-old Gauff beat Venus
Britain's Heather Watson was among those to welcome the change, saying: "Equality is always good."
Yet, as with the passing of all traditions, not everybody was completely won over.
Men's world number one Novak Djokovic said he supported the move, but added: "I thought that tradition was very unique and very special. I thought it was nice.
"It's definitely not easy to alter or change any traditions here that have been present for many years. It's quite surprising that they've done that."
What Wimbledon say
Prefixes are not used for pre-match announcements during warm-up or prior to first point (no change).
Prefixes will not be used when announcing 'game…' score and end of match score 'game, set, match…' (change to achieve consistency for both women and men).
Prefixes will be used for code violations, medical announcements and player challenges (no change - aligned with other tournaments).
In summary, the only change is to remove the use of prefixes when announcing the score at the end of each game and at the end of each match.