A Feminist Recap of the 2015 Australian Open

The first of the four tennis Grand Slams for the year ended this weekend with stellar matches on the women’s and men’s sides of the tournament. Serena Williams, 33 years old and one of the best players in the history of the sport, beat media-darling Maria Sharapova in straight sets. The women’s championship, between the #1 and #2 seeded players, was perhaps not the most unexpected turnout for a major final, but the match itself was jaw-dropping in tennis excellence. Not jaw-dropping, though, was the level of social grace faux pas the media committed during coverage of the women’s matches. For tennis fans, the sexism in media coverage is nothing new.

Tennis is riddled with gender complexities. Unlike most sports, save soccer and perhaps basketball, coverage of the ATP (men’s tennis) and the WTA (women’s tennis) is generally equal as far as televised and web-streaming coverage. Old-school print media tends to lag, where for every four articles about men’s matches during major tournaments, there is one article covering the women’s side. This is nothing new, either.

Tickets for mixed and men’s tournaments far outsell women-only tournaments like the Yale Open in Connecticut. As of 2007, the four major tournaments, The Australian Open, The French Open, Wimbledon and The U.S. Open, finally offer equal prize money for the men’s and women’s sides. However, this change in gender equity has been criticized by players themselves; most notably, French players Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Gilles Simon criticized the equality in pay two years ago, arguing that men’s tennis is “more interesting” than women’s tennis. Women’s Grand Slam finals are played to best of three sets, while men’s finals are played to best of five sets. These rules, however, are not set by the women players, who have openly offered to play best of five sets. It’s the broadcasters and tournament owners themselves who favor scheduling women’s matches to be shorter than men’s matches.

Which brings us to this year’s Australian Open. In the first round, English up-and-comer Heather Watson lost in straight sets to Tsvetana Pironkova. In her post-match interview, Watson cited her menstrual cramps as a factor in her loss. This admission of being a woman turned the media world on its head, as though sports reporting is required to maintain a Victorian sense of femininity.

Later in the week, Eugenie Bouchard handily beat Kiki Bertens 6-0, 6-3, only to be asked in a post-match court side interview to “give us a twirl” in her tennis dress. The interviewer was reporting for Australia’s Channel 7, and a spokesperson later said the interview did not air in Australia. For the viewers streaming the match online, it was hard to ignore. On the men’s side, Andy Murray, ranked #6 in the world, hired Amelie Mauresmo as a coach last year to help propel his game to a major final. He failed to progress past a semifinal in all four majors last year, and the media questioned her coaching skills directly to Murray in interviews. This year, despite making it to the final (only to be beaten by #1-ranked Novak Djokovic), Murray continued to field questions about the quality of Mauresmo’s coaching. While many female players have women coaches, the tennis world can’t seem to get its head around a male player trusting in a female coach when it comes to major titles.

Female players have been criticized by the media, and by other players, for bringing “emotions” and “hormones” onto the court. Of course they do. But I have seen countless men cry tears of joy in victory and defeat, and even more break tennis racquets and verbally berate themselves on court in anger. Players have even lost points to “racquet abuse” in matches. And it’s not the women. For every time Serena Williams had an angry outburst at a line judge (once), just look at John McEnroe. And the media still says women are too “emotional.”

As McEnroe said, you’ve got to be kidding me.

Header image credit: Steven Pisano/Flickr