--- title: Wimbledon CEO Defends Court Conditions After Player Gripes description: The Wimbledon CEO has defended court conditions at the world's most storied Grand Slam after a spate of players criticized them. canonical: https://time.com/4852578/wimbledon-court-conditions-complaints-tennis/ author: Joseph Hincks article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-07-11T07:37:51.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T16:30:07.235Z article:section: Sports og:title: Wimbledon's CEO Defends Court Conditions og:description: Several players have complained about the state of the courts. og:url: https://time.com/4852578/wimbledon-court-conditions-complaints-tennis/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltced6061a6d7cd7dc/6988d5264ee2625ee730e146/gettyimages-812329328.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Wimbledon 2017 - Day Eight - The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Wimbledon's CEO Defends Court Conditions twitter:description: Several players have complained about the state of the courts. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltced6061a6d7cd7dc/6988d5264ee2625ee730e146/gettyimages-812329328.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Wimbledon's CEO Defends Court Conditions After Several Player Complaints > Sponsored content. 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Terms and conditions apply. * Savings buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Savings Account. * No ATM fees from Ally Bank at Allpoint and Moneypass ATMs plus we reimburse for fees charged by other ATM owners nationwide up to $10 per statement cycle. * Early direct deposit offers eligible direct deposits up to two days sooner. * Spending buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Spending Account. by [Joseph Hincks](https://time.com/author/joseph-hincks/) ## Joseph Hincks Jul 11, 2017 7:37 AM UTC  The covers are taken off on center court ahead of day eight of the Wimbledon Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, Wimbledon. The covers are taken off on center court ahead of day eight of the Wimbledon Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, Wimbledon.Philip Toscano—PA Images via Getty Images by [Joseph Hincks](https://time.com/author/joseph-hincks/) ## Joseph Hincks Jul 11, 2017 7:37 AM UTC Wimbledon’s chief executive has defended court conditions at the world’s most storied grand slam after a spate of players had criticized the playing surfaces. The courts at the All England Club are “as good as they’ve ever been” Richard Lewis said Monday, [according to](http://www.bbc.com/sport/tennis/40555765) the BBC. “I haven’t seen anything in the first week that concerned me at all,” he added But last week, Britain’s number one seed Andy Murray expressed the opposite. After his four-set dispatch of Italy’s Fabio Fognini on Friday, the 2016 champion described conditions on center court as “not as good as previous years.” Fognini agreed, telling the BBC that they were “really, really bad.” The day before, France’s 12th seed Kristina Mladenovic made similar complaints after she injured her ankle and knee during a three-set loss to the USA’s Alison Riske. “It’s very slippery. There’s no grass,” Mladenovic said of the area around the baselines in Court 18\. “You kind of have to run light and be careful, not to push or press too much, too hard, which is strange to play on,” she added. Mladenovic and other players have suggested surface conditions could be down to lack of rain and relatively high temperatures — which reached 30C (86F) last week. But the BBC reports that Lewis attributed the complaints to players being in “the heat of battle” and insisted he’d seen nothing amiss. Surface conditions are just one of the Wimbledon controversies playing out this year. Others include players pulling up early with injuries, a [spate of unsporting conduct](http://time.com/4848534/wimbledon-fines-tomic-medvedev/), and [assigning higher-profile courts](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/10/sports/tennis/in-a-cozy-setting-at-wimbledon-the-womens-game-suffers-an-indignity.html) to men’s matches rather than women’s. \[[BBC](http://www.bbc.com/sport/tennis/40555765)\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4852578/wimbledon-court-conditions-complaints-tennis/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4852578/wimbledon-court-conditions-complaints-tennis/"},"headline":"Wimbledon's CEO Defends Court Conditions After Several Player Complaints","datePublished":"2017-07-11T07:37:51.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T16:30:07.235Z","description":"Surface conditions are just one of the Wimbledon controversies playing out this year","url":"https://time.com/4852578/wimbledon-court-conditions-complaints-tennis/","keywords":["tennis","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltced6061a6d7cd7dc/6988d5264ee2625ee730e146/gettyimages-812329328.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Joseph Hincks","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/joseph-hincks/"}],"articleSection":"Sports","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltced6061a6d7cd7dc/6988d5264ee2625ee730e146/gettyimages-812329328.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Wimbledon 2017 - Day Eight - The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club","caption":"Wimbledon 2017 - Day Eight - The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club","creditText":"Philip Toscano—PA Images via Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/sports/","name":"Sports"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4852578/wimbledon-court-conditions-complaints-tennis/","name":"Wimbledon's CEO Defends Court Conditions After Several Player Complaints"}}]}] ```