AI writer served by Wimbledon and IBM commits double fault

Emma Raducanu, the British No 3, was referred to as the British No 1 in one of the AI-written articles. Photograph: Robert Prange/Getty Images

Wimbledon staff perhaps need not fear losing their jobs to the artificial intelligence revolution just yet, after the club’s latest experiment with generative technology got off to a shaky start.

Wimbledon’s new online feature, Catch Me Up, which publishes pre- and post-match player profiles with AI-generated stories and analysis, has made errors on the first day of the championships.

The new offering on Wimbledon’s app and website described the former US Open champion Emma Raducanu as the British No 1, although she is the No 3. The 21-year-old who grew up in Bromley was also described as having won 11 matches so far this year, when she has had 14 triumphs.

It also described a clash between 35-year-old Zhang Shuai, a two-time doubles grand slam champion from China who is on a losing streak, and Russia’s Daria Kasatkina, 27, as an “eagerly anticipated encounter between two up-and-coming players”.

Some of the blunders appeared to have been corrected after they were flagged by a user on X.

Wimbledon lauded the new feature created with the tech company IBM at an event last month. Jonathan Adashek, senior vice-president of marketing and communications for IBM, described the feature as an “exciting example of how we can use the power of generative AI to deliver compelling, insight-driven storytelling at scale”.

The All England Club added that the model had been trained on the Wimbledon editorial style, but Catch Me Up featured a series of US spellings on the first day it was rolled out.

A spokesperson for the All England Club said on Monday: “The Catch Me Up feature is a first-of-its-kind pilot within sport, delivered in partnership with IBM. This AI innovation will naturally continue to evolve as the system’s capability builds, with the assistance of human checks.

“This feature complements the traditional breadth of rich editorial content created by our team of writers who provide in-depth coverage of the championships for audiences around the world.”

It comes after Wimbledon faced criticism last year after trialled AI-powered commentary and captions in its online highlights videos, which has been scrapped this year.

The former British No 1 and BBC pundit Annabel Croft last year described the move as an “insult” to her profession. “It’s a race against the robot for your job,” she told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

“Whoever is taking the decision to put a robot on to commentary, and of course into the wider context of all jobs in life, this is going to kill humanity. I mean, what is going on?

“I think it’s an insult to my profession that you can put a robot into that place. Already, somebody has had that job taken away from them. That would have been somebody who would have been voicing over those clips of the highlights, who would have had a bit more emotion, feeling in it, some expertise. A robot has no feelings but that’s probably going to be built in next.”

Last year it also emerged that the All England Club was considering replacing line judges with artificial intelligence.