Following the Australian Open, calls for wholesale changes to the women’s game have been louder than ever.
After all, despite what was a largely underwhelming tournament, devoid of drama and entertainment, the men’s semi-final matches more than made up for it.
Carlos Alcaraz kicked the day off by outlasting Alexander Zverev in a dramatic five-set battle, before Novak Djokovic stunned the world, coming from behind to beat Jannik Sinner, the two-time defending Australian Open champion, also in five sets.
It has led many to argue that women should play best-of-five set matches, yet Martina Navratilova supposedly pushed for that back during her playing days, and has now revealed the response she got.
Martina Navratilova on women playing best-of-five-set matches
Taking to Twitter nearly two years ago now, her response came after one fan questioned when women would match the men and play best-of-five sets at the Grand Slams.
The 18-time Grand Slam singles champion responded by writing: “I am so tired of answering this question. We offered to play 3 out of 5 decades ago and were told no. So here we are.”
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The ‘we’ in question refers to her and Chris Evert, and Navratilova would later speak about her confusion over the lawmakers, who did implement the format change before reverting back to the original that remains today.
Navratilova argued: “I don’t know why they took it away because it was a big controversy when they started to receive us like let’s give it a go. Of course we wanted to play when you get equal prize money and the majors and the beef against that was well we only play two out of three.
“We had maybe 10 years of that and then they stopped it. Again I don’t know why they stopped.”
Craig Tiley has said he hopes women will be playing best-of-five-set matches as soon as 2027.
What did Jessica Pegula say about playing best-of-five matches?
Although Navratilova’s argument was not that long ago, Madison Keys and Jessica Pegula have offered an even more contemporary viewpoint from top players currently playing on the WTA Tour.
Speaking about it after an enthralling round of men’s semi-final matches, both of which went the distance and thrilled supporters, calls for women to play the same length matches intensified.
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However, Pegula argued that if they were to make such a monumental change, the men’s game should too.
She simply stated: “Would I want to? No.”
Keys then added: “I think we’re all capable of doing it, but I don’t think I would sign up to do more. I think that if we were to do that, I think you would change the men as well. They also only play 3 out of 5 quarterfinals on.”
