British tennis bans transgender women from all competitive matches

The Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) has banned transgender women from all competitive female matches, even if those matches are only part of internal club competitions.

The news that the LTA has widened its support for female tennis and padel players was welcomed by Baroness Davies of Devonport, the former Olympic swimming medallist who has led the opposition to transgender participation in female sports.

“Good,” Davies wrote in a post on X. “Sports are now doing what they should have always done. Protect their female players & athletes from unfair sport. That’s a busy responsibility.”

The LTA had already been among the stricter sporting bodies on this point, issuing guidance that affected county and national competitions – as well as inter-club matches – at the end of 2024.

At that stage, they had decided to leave individual clubs to make their own policy for internal ladders, leagues and knockout competitions. However, the picture has now changed as a result of updated rules issued by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) this week.

On reviewing the EHRC’s policy – which updates the previous 2011 stance and is informed by last year’s Supreme Court ruling that the “concept of sex is binary” – the LTA now believes it has no choice but to extend their restriction on transgender participation to all competitive matchplay at any level.

Tennis has thus far been spared any major controversies about non-binary athletes entering women’s events, although there was one high-profile transgender player – Renée Richards – who competed at tour level in the 1970s, and went on to become Martina Navratilova’s coach.

Richards later said that the biological advantages of male-born players gave them a clear advantage after transition, adding that she would have been the best player on the women’s tour if she had transitioned and entered competitions in her 20s. As it was, she made the switch in her early 40s, which limited her impact.

Navratilova has become one of the leading voices in opposition to transgender inclusion in tennis. “It’s insane and it’s cheating,” she wrote in a column for TheSunday Times in 2019. “I am happy to address a transgender woman in whatever form she prefers, but I would not be happy to compete against her. It would not be fair.”

In its original guidance from 2024, the LTA stated: “It is clear that tennis and padel are gender-affected sports – the average man has an advantage when playing against the average woman. This includes longer levers with which to reach and hit the ball and increased cardio-vascular capacity means being able to get around the court more easily”.