Ball ladies, birthday desserts spark controversy
What ought to have been a celebratory weekend for Madrid Open tennis champions Arnya Sabalenka and Carlos Alcaraz was at the very least considerably dimmed by complaints of unequal therapy. And that wasn’t the one controversy to floor over the course of the event.
In a contented coincidence, Sabalenka — who defeated World No. 1 Iga Switek within the girls’s ultimate − and Alcaraz − who downed Jan-Lennard Struff for the lads’s title − each celebrated birthdays on Friday. And each had been introduced with birthday desserts by event officers.
Nonetheless, when photographs of the 2 gamers posing with their pastries had been posted side-by-side, the distinction was readily obvious. Girls’s doubles champion Victoria Azarenka, who was a part of one other unrelated controversy two days later, known as consideration to it on social media.
Madrid Open cake controversy
Match director Feliciano Lopez responded to the criticism by declaring Alcaraz, 20, had simply received his semifinal match on heart court docket when he acquired his gigantic birthday cake. And the Spaniard was enjoying in entrance of his dwelling followers.
In the meantime, the Belarussian-born Sabalenka, who simply turned 25, acquired a single-tier cake after her semifinal win.
“That doesn’t look proper,” world No. 27 Bianca Andreescu of Canada commented.
One other males’s participant, Holger Rune, additionally celebrated his birthday throughout the event and acquired a cake related in dimension to Sabalenka’s, event officers identified.
Girls’s doubles finalists have speeches canceled
In the meantime, Azarenka and her doubles accomplice Beatriz Haddad-Maia defeated People Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula in Sunday’s ultimate, however in a break with custom weren’t given a possibility to handle the group after the match.
The finalists in males’s doubles and each the lads’s and girls’s singles had been all allowed to supply their remarks on the occasion.
Gauff was notably upset, however remained upbeat as she voiced her issues on social media.
“Wasn’t given the possibility to talk after the ultimate at the moment:( However thanks to the followers for supporting us and girls’s tennis this week!” she tweeted.
There was no official reason why the ladies’s doubles speeches had been canceled. Nonetheless, the event has confronted criticism prior to now for its scheduling of ladies’s matches. Swiatek famous in her speech after the ladies’s singles ultimate that her semifinal did not end till 1 a.m.
Ball lady outfits endure abrupt change
One other controversy brewing all through the fortnight in Madrid concerned the apparel of the courtside attendants.
On the principle court docket throughout males’s matches, the all-female ball crew wore quick skirts and midriff-baring tops − whereas youthful ball girls and boys in additional conservative outfits had been on responsibility on the outer courts.
After complaints had been raised, together with these from followers watching on tv, the revealing outfits seen via the semifinal spherical had been changed by three-quarter-length skirts for Sunday’s males’s ultimate.