“Now that no foreign sports stars can afford to come over to the UK because of the 50 per cent tax, the only ones playing will be British players,” Henry Davenport, the BBC’s tennis correspondent said.
According to sports experts the draconian tax laws will restrict the growth of all British sport and not just tennis.
“No one is coming to these shores anymore. And would you blame them? How about I take away half of your money and give it to Gordon Brown to waste on some useless tinpot idea,” John Edwards, an Olympic athlete told the Times.
Officials at Wimbledon are just as baffled as the rest of the sports world, because with no foreign players coming to Wimbledon there will only be a few British players to play the games.
“We’re trying to train people up right now to fill in the spaces. We’ve only got three British players who can play professional standard tennis, so we’re going to all the parks and putting up signs on trees etc to see if anyone wants to play at Wimbledon. We can’t pay anyone but if you participate we’ll give you a few sandwiches and a cup of dishwater for your troubles,” Colonel Graham Fortnoy, the Wimbledon Lawn Director told the BBC.
The positive outcome of the 50 per cent tax issue is that this year there will finally be a British tennis champion after seventy four years.
