Inside Wimbledon Media Weekend

21 Interviews and one very busy weekend

It has been a frantic week. Media weekend was as exciting and exhausting as ever. I did a terrible job of trying to watch the F1 and do my interviews. Or maybe I did a good job, because I concentrated on the tennis, which is what I should have been doing all along!

On Saturday I spoke to 10 players, with another 11 on Sunday. It’s not the interviews themselves that take the time, it’s the research and preparation.

You might only get a few questions with some players, but you need to try to fit in topics that work for all the broadcasters. This weekend I was working for World Broadcast Services, which means my interviews are distributed and made available to anyone who wants them. Not every broadcaster gets the opportunity to speak to the players, so I do the interviews on behalf of everyone, and they can use them however they wish.

We also had some players observing the media strike rules, so those interviews were shorter.

If you haven’t seen what’s been happening, some players have decided to curtail their media activities in protest over the percentage of prize money paid to players at the Grand Slams. Rather than boycotting matches, players are limiting their contractual media commitments to 15 minutes. The 15-minute limit is symbolic, reflecting their claim that players currently receive roughly 15% of tournament revenues. The protest began at the French Open and has continued into Wimbledon.

(Interviewing Flavio Cobolli)