While the tennis world is full of celebratory comments about the career of the American tennis player Serena Williams, it is often not the case on social networks. The playing legend announced via Vogue magazine on Tuesday that the coming weeks will be her last on the professional circuit. However, the former editor of the British newspaper The Sun took a sharp dig at her.
Kelvin MacKenzie, who claims on Twitter to be the most successful editor-in-chief of the British newspaper The Sun, has now embarked on one of the most successful female tennis players of all time.
He did not like the statement of Serena Williams, who in an article on Tuesday explained the reasons why she no longer wants to spend time on the circuit and prefer to focus on her family.
“If I were a man, I would not be writing this, I would continue to play and win, while my wife would work to expand the family,” wrote the twenty-three-time Grand Slam champion, who will be 41 in September, in one of the paragraphs in Vogue magazine.
MacKenzie strongly disagrees with her. “I’m sick of how he’s turning the end of his career into a gender war. At 41, there are no more Grand Slam champions regardless of gender,” he wrote on Twitter.
Nauseating to see @serenawilliams turn her retirement into a sex war by saying; ” If I were a guy I’d be out playing and winning while my wife was doing the physical labour of expanding our family.” She’s almost 41. There are no major tennis champs at 41. Of either sex.
— Kelvin MacKenzie (@kelvmackenzie) August 10, 2022
At the same time, the mother of a four-year-old daughter, Olympia, claimed her first win in Toronto this week after a year and two months, when she beat the Spaniard Nuria Párrizas.
“I try to enjoy these moments. It’s like the light at the end of the tunnel. I’m getting closer to it and I can’t wait to go through it,” Williams said.
She wanted to avoid the word “retirement” herself. “I’ve never liked that label. It doesn’t feel modern to me. I think of it as a transition, but I want to be careful when using the word because it means something very specific and important to a certain community of people. Probably the best word to describe it , is evolution,” she added.
In addition to 23 Grand Slam trophies, the American has another fifty WTA titles to her credit. She also has Olympic gold and five victories at the Tournament of Champions.
