This Tuesday the creation of ‘6 Kings Slam’, an exhibition tennis tournament that will feature the presence of players of the caliber of Rafa Nadal, Carlos Alcaraz, Novak DjokovicDaniil Medvedev, Jannik Sinner and Holger Rune.
Without a doubt, a luxury poster for an event that comes with controversy. And it is that It is organized by Saudi Arabia, a country that is in the eye of the hurricane for systematically violating several universal rights.
Women and homosexuals are two of the most discriminated groupssomething that causes outrage in the world of tennis, especially among former players, who can express themselves more freely as they are no longer active.
One of them is Andy Roddick, who did not mince his words when it came to highlighting the enormous contradiction that exists in the fact that the women’s circuit is negotiating the entry of Saudi Arabia, either to organize a Premier 1000 tournament or even the WTA Finals, still without a venue for 2024.
“The devil is in the details. Homosexuality is illegal. But we have openly gay players. Kasatkina came out of the closet last year. “If she goes there to play, are we just telling her to take a week off from her sexuality?” Roddick lamented on journalist Jon Wertheim’s podcast.
“How do we protect our own players whose life decisions are considered criminal when they enter this place? How do we protect those mechanisms? And can you trust what is said now when it is put into practice?” reflected the former world number 1.
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Roddick joins legends with Martina Navratilova and Chris Evertwinners of 18 Grand Slam titles each, who criticized in a column in the ‘Washington Post’ the possible decision of the WTA to move the Finals – the tournament that brings together the best eight tennis players of the year – to Riyadh for being ” incompatible with the spirit of women’s tennis.
“It’s not just that in that country women are not seen as equals, It is a country in which there is a law that women are the property of men. A country that criminalizes the LGBTQ community to the point of death sentences. “A country whose record of human rights and basic freedoms has been the subject of international concern for decades,” the two tennis legends said.
Among active players, there are opinions for all tastes. Although tennis players such as the Tunisian Ons Jabeur have been in favor that there are tournaments in Saudi Arabia, others like the Russian Daria Kasatkinawho declared himself gay in 2022, They have criticized the WTA decision of moving tournaments to this country, in this case because she did not feel safe.
2024-02-07 09:20:42
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