Wimbledon to drop 'Mrs' and 'Miss' from women's honours boards

Wimbledon has confirmed its intention to update the way it represents female champions on its honours boards in time for next month’s Championships.

Traditionally, the names of female winners have been given the prefix ‘Miss’ or ‘Mrs’ whilst men have merely been referenced by their first initial.

This has been the case since the tournament first took place in 1877.

The All England Club acknowledged a report in the Times that revealed it was making the move in order to further modernise the tournament.

Married winners will also be recorded using their own names, rather than those of their husbands, as was applied to Chris Evert, who appeared as ‘Mrs. J.M. Lloyd’ when she won the tournament in 1981.

It follows a ruling in 2019 that umpires would no longer refer to female players with a prefix, instead joining the practice of referencing male players simply by their surnames.

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