French tennis player Gilles Simon invited the wrath of women around the world, by saying women tennis players don't deserve to receive equal prize money as their male counterparts.

Simon, who was recently elected to the council of the Association of Tennis Professionals, said women do not attract as much support as the men and spend only half as much time on court.

The prize money has been the same in all Grand Slams for a while now, but Simon, seeded 13 at Wimbledon, believes it needs to change.

"I think that men's tennis is really ahead of women's tennis at this stage," he told the French radio station France Info after winning his first-round match against compatriot Paul-Henri -Mathieu.

"Once more, the men spent surely twice as much time on court as the women at the French Open. We often talk about salary equality. I don't think it's something that works in sport.

"I think we are the only sport that has parity with the women in terms of prize money. Meanwhile, men's tennis remains more attractive than women's tennis at this moment."

While the men's and women's tours operate independently, there are a few tournaments, outside the Grand Slams, that run together.

Simon said he was not happy with the Rome Masters tournament joining hands with the women's event. "The year before, the women, for their final, they had 20 spectators," he told L'Equipe.

"And so, in that case, you save them, but when you want a practice court, there aren't any left.

"Am I going to incur the wrath of feminist organizations? I don't care," the Frenchman said, while pointing out women play best-of-three sets to the best-of-five sets played by the men in Grand Slams.