American John Isner has called for injured tennis players to receive prizemoney for withdrawing before tournaments begin.
He suggested such a scheme could have countered the spate of Australian Open first-round withdrawals, as injured players wouldn’t have the incentive of showing up just for the money.
Isner pulled out midway through his opening match against Slovakian lucky loser Martin Klizan on Tuesday.
The 13th seed is one of five men to have withdrawn during the first round over the first two days at Melbourne Park, including 12th seed Tommy Haas on Monday.
Slovenian Polona Hercog also played just one game, before withdrawing from her first-round match against Frenchwoman Alize Cornet on Tuesday.
All of those players receive $30,000 as first-round losers, which they would have missed out on had they withdrawn beforehand.
Isner said it would be better for the event if injured players received at least a portion of that money for not playing, giving them incentive to let healthy players replace them in the draw.
“Maybe a rule could be put in place where the person who pulls out gets compensated 75 per cent, 80 per cent, maybe even 100 per cent of the first-round prize money,” Isner told reporters.
“I would be in favour of a rule change because (Hercog) earned her spot in the main draw and if she’s hurt, you don’t want to go out there and play one game.
“But I think she deserves to be compensated in some way and have a lucky loser come in and play for second-round prize money and points.”
Isner was trailing 6-2 7-6(8-6) when he pulled the pin because of an ankle injury which he sustained at the recent Hopman Cup in Perth.
The big-serving 208cm American surprised himself by winning the Auckland Open last week, despite playing through discomfort, but said it became too much to bear on Tuesday.
“I know movement is not the best part of my game, but at a certain point I’ve got to be able to move without pain and I wasn’t able to do that today,” he said.