A DAY before playing in the 2005 final at the All England Club, Venus Williams addressed a meeting of the grand slam Board, urging Wimbledon and the French Open to offer equal pay to male and female players.

“I said: ‘All of our hearts beat the same. When your eyes are closed, you really can’t tell, next to you, who’s a man and who’s a woman.’ And [I asked them] to think about their daughters and their wives and sisters. How would they like them to be treated?” Williams recalled.

“Sometimes, we lose track of, and don’t even realise, our own bias and our own prejudice. And we have to confront ourselves.”