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ATP chairman Andrea Gaudenzi has confirmed the ATP is willing to return to points to Wimbledon but the AELTC board first has to lift the player ban they imposed on Russian and Belarusian players. In April, Wimbledon announced player bans for Russian and Belarusian players.
The ATP and WTA had a strong reaction, removing ranking points from this year's Wimbledon. "The reason why we removed the points at Wimbledon is known; it is a matter of fairness and discrimination in response to a unilateral decision of the tournament that we do not consider right.
Such a decision should have been taken collectively involving all seven components of tennis," Gaudenzi said in a conversation with the Italian press, as revealed on Sportskeeda. "We would be very happy to return the points to Wimbledon if the ban on Russians and Belarusians, who have said they are willing to make written statements because none of them is in favour of war, were lifted."
Gaudenzi explains their decision on Wimbledon
"From a ranking point of view, we want to have a ranking in 2022 where each player had access to the same number of points.
This is the only way to have a fair ranking at the end of the year," Gaudenzi explained. "If we gave protection to those who played well at Wimbledon in 2021 it would be even more unfair to those who play well in 2022, because the points would still expire after 52 weeks as always happens.
We can’t protect seven or eight players by creating even more damage to everyone else. Unfortunately, Wimbledon points will be missing in the year-end ranking, but from our point of view it is the fairest choice and WTA agrees with us." Often describe the current situation as a lose-lose for all parties.
Russian and Belarusian players are not allowed to compete, while others won't be rewarded with ranking points for their results.