Serena Williams has a case when she suggests tennis can treat women poorly but there are countless examples of men being penalised for behaviour like hers in the US Open finalWhen Serena Williams threw away the US Open title she has won six times by calling the umpire “a liar” and “a thief”, she cited sexism as the root cause. No male player, she said, would be treated the way the umpire Carlos Ramos treated her.Sadly, she did her cause no good at all. Williams, while understandably upset, was wrong. Ramos, doing no more than his job demanded, was right. Intentionally or not, she accused him of bias that simply was not there – in these circumstances, at least. Related:...
The tennis player is one of the most unpredictable athletes in the world, but he can always be relied on for dramaThe main interview room in the bowels of Arthur Ashe Stadium was as packed with reporters and cameramen as you’ll find it after a second-round match on an otherwise routine Thursday afternoon during the first week of the US Open. The occasion was an audience with Nick Kyrgios, the mercurial Australian star who an hour earlier had seen off the Frenchman Pierre-Hugues Herbert amid sweltering heat and humidity on the fully exposed Court 17, where after what appeared to be a public unravelling was curtailed by an unusual intervention from the chair umpire Mohamed Lahyani, who descended from his...
Coach tempted out of retirement by prospect of working with 21-year-old German while creaking Murray returns to US Open as an almost invisible former championWhen Andy Murray hooked up with Ivan Lendl seven years ago, he seemed convinced that, after several experiments with other coaches, he and old Rock Jaw would be together for the rest of his career. Within a year, he had broken through for an Olympic gold medal and his first grand slam title at the US Open. Two Wimbledon titles would follow – then injury, struggle and no little angst.When Murray arrived this week in New York to prepare for the US Open, the last major of the season, he may have experienced a shiver of regret, or...
The Spaniard’s victory at the US Open for his 16th grand slam title was a tribute to his enduring commitment and he reacted to the triumph with typical graceIn three words, Rafael Nadal captured the essence of his tennis career and his life: “Very happy, no?”It was getting late at Flushing Meadows, a place where the Spanish clay-court supremo was never supposed to thrive but where he has appeared in four finals, won three titles and won 53 of 64 matches. Only a few hours earlier, he had neutered the power of the big South African Kevin Anderson to take his tally of majors to 16, again only three behind Roger Federer. Related: The US Open showed black women have...
It’s not hyperbolic to say the game in the States is alive because of African American players like the Williams sisters and Sloane StephensThere’s been no shortage of anxiety over the future of American tennis over the last decade.Andy Roddick’s abrupt retirement during the 2012 US Open left the United States without an active men’s grand slam champion for the first time in 129 years, since the inception of what then was called the US National Championships. And while Venus and Serena Williams have combined for 30 major singles championship, 121 WTA titles and 173 finals appearances – and counting – the hand-wringing over their successor on the women’s side persisted. Related: Sloane Stephens’ win over Madison Keys warms hearts...