“Naomi, you suck”
Osaka is insulted and bursts into tears
03/13/2022 10:06 am
Tennis star Naomi Osaka cried during her second round match at the WTA tournament in Indian Wells. The trigger is an interjection from the audience. The insult brings back memories of a bad incident between two colleagues in the Japanese woman.
Completely upset by an insulting heckling, Japanese tennis superstar Naomi Osaka was eliminated in the second round of the WTA tournament in Indian Wells. During and after the 6-0, 6-4 loss to Weronika Kudermetova of Russia, the four-time Grand Slam winner shed tears. “Naomi, you suck” (“Naomi, you suck”), it sounded in the first sentence from the ranks.
The 2018 tournament winner complained visibly emotionally to the referee. It already looked as if the former number one in the world tennis rankings wanted a microphone. As a result, a WTA official spoke to the Japanese for a long time, who kept throwing her head back and had teary eyes. The former world number one, who speaks openly about her problems with depression, is committed to more consideration for the mental health of athletes.
After the match, Osaka said the comment brought back memories of the scandal at the prestigious competition in California in 2001, when US stars Serena and Venus Williams were booed. Father Richard Williams had spoken of racist insults at the time. Osaka is black, like Americans Venus and Serena Williams. Whether the reputation from the ranks was related to Osaka’s skin color was not made clear during her short speech. She thanked the spectators who were still in the stadium several times.
“To be honest, I feel like it hasn’t really hit me when I’ve been disturbed. But here? I saw a video where Venus and Serena were booed here,” the crying Osaka said in the interview on the court. “I don’t know why, but it stuck in my head and was repeated many times.”