UP253 Re-Thinking Sport: Inside Wimbledon

This is an episode of ReThinking Sport, our series created in collaboration with Portas, the global strategy consultancy dedicated to sport and physical activity. This week we went to Wimbledon to talk to Jamie Baker and Alex Willis.Jamie was a professional tennis player, British number two and Davis Cup player who is now Tournament Director and Head of Professional Tennis at The All England Lawn Tennis Club. Alex is Wimbledon’s Communications and Marketing Director, responsible for the brand vision for The Championships. So we talked about the tennis product, the decision of the ATP and WTA Tours to remove world ranking points from this year’s event, what LIV Golf would look like in tennis, the challenges of domestic stars such as Emma Raducanu and Andy Murray and we talk about whether the grass court season, so important to the Wimbledon brand, is under threat. Every episode of ReThinking Sport can be found by searching Unofficial Partner via the big podcast providers, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or via your favourite podcast app. Alternatively, you can go direct to unofficialpartner.com and search ‘Portas’ and you’ll find series one and two in their entirety. Unofficial Partner is the leading podcast for the business of sport. A mix of entertaining and thought provoking conversations with a who's who of the global industry. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 500 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series and live events, you can reach us via the website.