Keys pushes the boycott idea back to the centre of the conversation
Grand Slam winner Madison Keys told AFP that the boycott option remained alive among “many players”, ten days prior to Roland-Garros.
Madison Keys, 2026 | © Zuma / PsNewz
World No.19 and 2025 Australian Open champion Madison Keys has said on Thursday she is “prepared” to boycott a Grand Slam tournament over the prize-money dispute. The American told AFP that the boycott option remained alive among “many players,” in the strongest endorsement of Aryna Sabalenka’s position by a Slam winner in over a week.
“It’s one of those things where it’s just something that you talk about until it actually happens,” Keys said. “So I’m as prepared [to boycott] as I need to be. It’s something that it seems as though many players are willing to do.”
She framed the question as one of broad consensus among the signatories of the letter sent by the top players to the four Slam organisers earlier this season. “Many players have united and agreed that if a boycott is what’s necessary, then we will boycott,” Keys said in the same interview. “I hope we don’t have to get to that. But it’s wonderful to see so many players, especially the younger ones, so willing to fight for the players as a whole.”
Swiatek and Zverev less affirmative
The intervention comes at a particular moment in the cycle. Last week, after Sabalenka’s “boycott” warning at the start of Rome reset the conversation, two of the other signatories pushed back on the framing in different ways. Iga Swiatek told reporters in Rome that boycotting the tournament was “a bit extreme kind of situation” and called for proper negotiation with the Slam authorities before any drastic step.
Alexander Zverev, asked specifically about the issue, said only that “we haven’t spoken about boycotting” among the players he was in contact with. Emma Raducanu, not a signatory, ruled out joining any boycott outright. The intensity of the language around the idea has, in the days since, visibly cooled.
The Roland-Garros main draw begins on Sunday 24 May, in ten days. The French Tennis Federation announced its 2026 prize-money package on 6 May: a record €61.7 million, up 9.5% on 2025. The top players’ joint statement on 5 May described the increase as insufficient, noting that revenues at Roland-Garros had grown 14% year-on-year while prize money had risen only 5.4%, leaving the players’ share of revenue at 14.3% – well below the 22% they have demanded, and below the 15.5% they received in 2024.
Keys herself has been out of competition for most of the last fortnight. She withdrew from Madrid with illness and lost in the third round at Rome. The AFP interview was given on the sidelines of the WTA 125 event in Paris this week, where she has been preparing for Roland-Garros.
Key’s logic
She also acknowledged the limits of her own current role in negotiations. “I sat on the WTA Player Council for many years, so I was extremely involved for a long time,” she told the same interview. “For the last year, I’ve been a bit less involved. But there are a lot of young players leading the fight, doing tremendous work. I’m delighted to support them.”
The Wimbledon prize-money announcement, expected in the coming weeks, is the next inflection point. If it follows the pattern of Roland-Garros – increasing the headline figure while leaving the revenue share below 15% – it would, on Keys’s logic, take the question out of the realm of negotiation and into the realm of action.
She has now said, in clearer terms than any Grand Slam champion has used in the past ten days, that she is willing to take it there.
