Wimbledon, the oldest Grand Slam tennis tournament, is replacing line umpires with line-calling ball tracking technology. This was reported by the Associated Press.
The All England Tennis Club has announced that starting in 2025, the championship will use technology to give out and foul signals, eliminating the need for referees. This technology has long been used at Wimbledon and other tennis tournaments to indicate whether a serve has been served or not.
The tournament organizers said the technology was successfully tested at the 2024 tournament and "is based on ball tracking technology that has been around for many years." In addition, other major tournaments have also switched to an electronic refereeing system. The Australian Open and the US Open have already abandoned human line judges.
“We consider the technology to be sufficiently robust and the time is right to take this important step in seeking maximum accuracy in our officiating,” says Sally Bolton, Executive Director of the All England Tennis Club.
Now the French Open remains the most conservative Grand Slam tennis tournament.
This year, Wimbledon also launched the Catch Me Up mobile app with integrated artificial intelligence that summarizes the matches.