Front Office Sports: "The Battle Over Wimbledon ’s Ambitious Expansion Plan"

Front Office Sports | 30 June 2025 | Mike Jakeman

Battle Over Wimbledon: "Wimbledon wants to triple its footprint. The plan has sparked a bitter standoff over the future of tennis’s oldest major."

"Wimbledon follows the same schedule each year: The singles quarterfinals land on the Tuesday and Wednesday of the second week, as the mood switches from festival to hard-nosed competition. But in 2025, the action on Centre Court will clash with a meeting eight miles away at the High Court in central London. It will be crucial in determining Wimbledon’s long-term future.

For decades, the All England Lawn Tennis Club, which hosts the tournament, has sought to expand its 157-year-old site. After buying neighboring land and paying off the tenants, it was eventually granted planning permission for a huge redevelopment in 2024. The proposed project is big: By adding another 39 courts, the total number will rise to 71—more than double the number in New York and Melbourne, and quadruple the total in Paris. The AELTC says the plan is so sweeping in part because grass courts deteriorate more quickly with use than the hard and clay courts used elsewhere.

But more than anything, they believe this approach would enable it to host its qualifying tournament in-house. Currently, Wimbledon is the only Grand Slam that lacks the space on its existing site to host its qualifiers. Instead, it rents courts at a club in Roehampton three miles away. Players have told Wimbledon organizers that qualifying is a less satisfactory experience than at the other Grand Slams, a criticism that the club takes extremely seriously.

The expansion also includes the creation of two new parks, a 23-acre area at the south end of the site and a 4-acre one at the north, along with a plan to clean up an existing lake and lay a boardwalk around it. Dominic Foster of the AELTC tells Front Office Sports that these commitments demonstrate that the expansion is intended to not only maintain the tournament’s position “at the pinnacle of sport but also provide substantial year-round public benefits.” (Wimbledon declined FOS’s request for comment on the project’s cost.)

But the plan’s implementation is proving a struggle: A group of local residents has raised a six-figure sum to challenge AELTC in court. The showdown is scheduled—remarkably—at the same time as Wimbledon itself...."

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