Thu, May 11, 2023 page16

• Pegula and Gauff criticise silencing of female players at the Madrid Open

  • The Guardian
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  The consequences of the Madrid Open’s decision to deny both women’s doubles finalists a speech during the trophy ceremony on Sunday rumbled on into the Internazionali BNL d’Italia in Rome on Tuesday as Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula expressed frustration about tournament organizers silencing players.

  Gauff and Pegula lost the final to Victoria Azarenka and Beatriz Haddad Maia.

  Pegula said she felt tension behind the scenes throughout a dramatic two weeks in Madrid and “had a feeling something would happen.”

  

  Belarus’ Victoria Azarenka, second right, and Brazil’s Beatriz Haddad, right, celebrate with their trophies after winning the Madrid Open women’s double final against the US’ Jessica Pegula, left, and Coco Gauff at the Magic Box in Madrid on Sunday last week.

  Photo: EPA-EFE

  She did not anticipate the organizers refusing to allow the players to address the crowd.

  “Did I think we were not going to be able to speak? No. I’ve never heard of that, like, in my life,” Pegula said at her pre-tournament news conference. “Even in a US$10K challenger final you would speak. I don’t know what century everyone was living in when they made that decision or how they actually had a conversation and decided: ‘Wow, this is a great decision we’re going to do, and there’s going to be no backlash against this.’”

  Tennis tournaments at all levels end each event with a trophy ceremony and both finalists almost always give speeches. In the men’s doubles final a day earlier, both teams spoke.

  The women’s finalists did not know their speech had been cut until they were ushered to take photographs with their trophies.

  “The guy was like: ‘Now you go up on the podium and take one [photo] together.’ Then Vika [Azarenka] turned to us and said: ‘There’s no speeches.’ We were like: ‘What?’ She was like: ‘We’re not allowed to talk,’” Pegula said.

  Sunday’s events were preceded by issues, serious and amusing, during the tournament. Organizers were mocked on Twitter for providing a much larger cake on Friday last week to Carlos Alcaraz than fellow world No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka, who shares a birthday with him.

  Azarenka responded to a viral tweet on the subject by implying that it reflected the tournament’s treatment of the respective genders.

  “Couldn’t be more accurate on the treatment,” she wrote.

  After the final, Gauff sought out the tournament officials and said that she received an apology.

  “I was told it was a situation that didn’t involve me that happened,” Gauff said. “I’m not going to go into that situation. People probably know what it was, but, yeah, that’s what I was told.”

  “I said that situation for me was not deep enough to not have a trophy ceremony. I think that we worked hard to get to that final,” she said.

  For Gauff, the main issue is that a tournament silencing players sets a dangerous precedent and tournaments should be able to absorb criticism, even publicly, without retaliating.

  “But I think it was just more about the principle behind it, that in future cases, maybe me or somebody else, criticizes the organization or tournament, maybe deeper than what was said, I don’t know, maybe racism, homophobia, something like that. You can’t just cut, no speech, no nothing. You have to take those criticisms,” Gauff said.
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