Two tickets for Wimbledon Centre Court? That’ll be £586,000 please

There are 2,520 Centre Court debentures, which guarantee a seat for each of the 14 days of the tournament for five years. Photograph: Cameron Spencer/Getty Images View image in fullscreen There are 2,520 Centre Court debentures, which guarantee a seat for each of the 14 days of the tournament for five years. Photograph: Cameron Spencer/Getty Images Two tickets for Wimbledon Centre Court? That’ll be £586,000 please A pair of debenture tickets changed hands this week for a sum far beyond the means of ordinary tennis fans L ike many of us, Marcos Ortega enters the Wimbledon public ticket ballot every year in the hope of seeing some championship tennis. In seven straight years of trying, however, he has never got lucky. So he was delighted – initially, at least – to learn there was a way to secure a ticket for every game played on Centre Court. But Ortega’s hopeful delight quickly turned to anger when he discovered that it would cost him £293,000. “I’ve played tennis all my life and I’d really love to go to Wimbledon. It’s the premier tennis competition in the world,” he said. “But I’ve never got any in the ballot, and the queue is ridiculous. Now, I learn that if you’re rich enough there is a way to pay your way in. It doesn’t seem fair.” Ortega, 39, an architect from Spain who lives in Manor House, north London, had discovered the little-known world of Wimbledon debentures – special season tickets snapped up by members of the global super-rich elite. There are 2,520 Centre Court debentures, which guarantee a seat for each of the 14 days of the tournament for not one but five years. The All England Lawn Tennis Club, the private members organisation that has run the Wimbledon championship since 1868, last sold the debentures in 2024 , for £116,000 each, raising £292m to help fund a major development . The owners of debentures, which are classed as financial instruments like shares and bonds, can resell their whole allocation every Thursday at 11am . This week, someone sold two debenture tickets for £586,000. Despite spending all that money, the unknown buyer will not be able to go to the next two weeks’ matches because the rights to this year’s tournament were fixed in May. The buyer will, however, be able to go to every Centre Court match from next year until 2030. If that’s too much tennis to enjoy, they can sell some or all of the tickets on a day-by-day basis for profit without any restrictions. Last year the government brought in a law banning the resale of tickets for live sporting events above their face value, but Wimbledon debentures are exempt. Debenture tickets for this year’s men’s final are available on secondary ticketing websites for £29,079 each. “Wimbledon promotes itself as the most democratic and diverse tournament,” Ortega said while warming up for a friendly match with his girlfriend on public courts in Clissold Park, north London. “But this shows it is really about making the most money possible.” View image in fullscreen ‘It do