- Organizers of the Madrid Open are apologetic for failing to allow women’s doubles finalists give a speech
- Four WTA players were not allowed to give a speech after the match on Sunday
- There was a lot of misogyny with the tournament’s officials
Organizers of the Madrid Open are apologetic for failing to allow women’s doubles finalists to address the convention on the court after Sunday’s match.
Beatriz Haddad Maia and Victoria Azarenka were the tournament’s women’s doubles winners against Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula.
Azarenka and Mai downed Pegulla and Gauff in a thrilling 6-1 6-4 final match. As is tradition, the four players should have been allowed to give a speech.
According to PA news agency, WTA is conducting a probe on the issue and the Madrid Open CEO Gerard Tsobanian is remorseful about it.
The WTA is seeking to find out if her players were ill-treated at Caja Magica. Madrid Open is among the most esteemed tournaments after the four major slams.
All four players expressed their discontentment with the tournament’s officials with Pegula questioning the era they are living in.
Madrid Open women’s doubles winners Beatriz Haddad Maia and Victoria Azarenka Photo/CNN
In his apology, Tsobanian noted that they have apologised to the four players involved.
“We sincerely apologise to all the players and fans who expect more of the Mutua Madrid Open tournament.
“Not giving our women’s doubles finalists the chance to address their fans at the end of the match was unacceptable and we have apologised directly to Victoria, Beatriz, Coco and Jessica,” he stated.
He added that he is working with the WTA to re-evaluate their protocols in a bid to make the tournament better in future. The Madrid Open boss said such an incident won’t happen again.
“We are working internally and with the WTA to review our protocols and are committed to improving our process moving forward. We made a mistake and this will not ever happen again,” his apologetic tweet read.
Besides speech denial, Madrid Open also battled criticism over the all-too-revealing outfits worn by model ball girls on the main court.
A third wave of criticism came when Carlos Alcaraz got a bigger cake to celebrate his birthday on May 5 at the tournament. Yet, Aryna Sabalenka who won the Madrid Open singles only got a cake smaller in size compared to what Alcaraz got because they share a birthday.
Madrid Open model ball girls. Photo/Fox Sports
Both the outfits and cake size sparked a sad tale of apparent misogyny that female tennis players grapple with every day.
Madrid Open is known for its controversy. Now under the sporting agency IMG, it has a tainted history of favouring men more than women.
In putting this into context, Azarenka tweeted sarcastically about her cake saying “couldn’t be more accurate on the treatment.”
As Sabalenka cracked jokes pegged on her birthday cake, Iga Swiatek who played the Belarusian in the tournament’s final was angry for playing at 12 am.
Feliciano Lopez, the Madrid Open director was on the firing line over these complaints and he equally responded to Sabalenka’s cake banter on Twitter.
While the WTA is yet to issue a public statement on the matter, sources say it is aware of all the mistreatment of its players and is investigating.
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