52 years after the duel between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs, there was one other gender comparability in tennis. The at the moment finest feminine participant on this planet loses to the out-of-form males’s enfant horrible.
Australian Nick Kyrgios has received the extremely anticipated Battle of the Sexes in tennis in opposition to world primary Aryna Sabalenka. The 30-year-old prevailed 6:3, 6:3 in opposition to the Belarusian, who was three years youthful, in a lower than spectacular present occasion in Dubai.
The completely injured Kyrgios, who has not performed an official match on the tour since March and has fallen to quantity 671 on this planet rankings, not often had critical issues with the at the moment finest tennis participant on this planet. The 2022 Wimbledon finalist was removed from his prime bodily form.
“I put up a great fight,” Sabalenka stated afterwards and not directly supplied Kyrgios a rematch: “I love revenge and I love challenges. I would love to play again.” Kyrgios paid his opponent nice respect: “She is such a great champion.”
Sabalenka’s entrance in a glittering swimsuit to the track “Eye of the Tiger” confirmed that the main target was on enjoyable and never seriousness. During a break, the four-time Grand Slam match winner additionally danced for the viewers. Among the spectators within the Coca-Cola Arena was Brazil’s former soccer star Ronaldo.
Sabalenka and Kyrgios, who’re below contract with the identical consulting company, did lots of promoting for the present occasion earlier than the primary serve. But there was additionally loads of criticism from the tennis scene. One level of criticism was that Sabalenka and subsequently ladies’s tennis couldn’t win something on this match.
Adjusted guidelines for the Battle of Sexes
There have been just a few modifications in comparison with regular tennis matches. So each protagonists solely had one serve. There have been no modifications of sides as Sabalenka’s facet of the pitch was 9 p.c smaller than Kyrgios’s. The intention was to create situations that have been as honest as doable.
From an anatomical perspective, males hit tougher than ladies, although Sabalenka is likely one of the strongest gamers on the tennis tour.
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The tennis battle of the sexes originated in 1973. Bobby Riggs, former world primary and Wimbledon winner, challenged the highest gamers on the age of 55. The Australian Margaret Court, then probably the most profitable participant on this planet, suffered a crushing defeat 2:6, 1:6, which went down in historical past because the “Mother’s Day Massacre”.
A bit of later, Billie Jean King received in opposition to Riggs, and this victory was an enormous success for girls’s sports activities. More than 50 million folks watched within the USA alone. The spectacle was made into a movie in 2017, starring Emma Stone and Steve Carell.
lwö/dpa
https://www.welt.de/sport/tennis/article695159c5f3140d4649da465d/tennis-battle-of-the-sexes-sabalenka-verliert-geschlechterkampf-gegen-kyrgios.html