After a gruelling three-set loss, Coleman Wong had to endure an outburst of fury directed at him from the stands: \u201cI lost a lot of money because of you\u201d<\/p>\n
The man pushed through the crowd just to confront Wong, el \u201cculpable\u201d de la tragedia financiera del disgruntled espectador durante el Challenger Ostrava event in April.<\/p>\n
The Hong Kong world No 173, who recently progressed to the third round at the US Open, is no stranger to receiving abusive online messages. But in Czech Republic, the usual faceless names attached to throwaway social media accounts presented themselves as an immediate threat. It was the first time Wong was harassed at a live event.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt threatened,\u201d said the 21-year-old. \u201cIt\u2019s too much. I\u2019m just doing what I love, playing tennis around the world and having people coming \u2026 you know \u2026 it\u2019s just not good for tennis. It\u2019s tough because every player gets this. When you\u2019re in Challengers, if you lose a match, you get tons of death threats and everything on social media. It\u2019s getting out of hand.\u201d<\/p>\n
These instances in online spaces are becoming worryingly commonplace for professional tennis players. Statistics from data science company Signify Group<\/a>, published by the Women\u2019s Tennis Association and International Tennis Federation (ITF) in 2024, revealed about 8,000 abusive, violent or threatening comments were dished out to 458 players through their social media platforms that year.<\/p>\n French player Caroline Garcia, now retired, went public on X <\/a>in August 2024 with examples of messages \u2014 \u201cyou should consider killing yourself\u201d, \u201ca clown belongs in the circus\u201d \u2014 she received following losses. More recently, Ukrainian professional Elina Svitolina took to her Instagram story<\/a> to post chilling screenshots. One abuser said they hoped Russia \u201ckills all you Ukrainians\u201d, referencing the ongoing war in Svitolina\u2019s home country.<\/p>\n After mentally and physically sapping matches, often lasting for hours and ending in defeat, the last thing players want directed at them are unsettling messages. German player Maximilian Marterer told CLAY: \u201cIt\u2019s Instagram mostly, that\u2019s the one I use most. I think that\u2019s a thing they (social media platforms) have to solve. It\u2019s not our job to do it. We\u2019re just sports people and that\u2019s what we want to be seen as. It\u2019s a very sad point in our sport.\u201d<\/p>\n Of the 8,000 comments flagged by Signify Group, 40% were determined to have been sent by angry gamblers. North American world No 113 Tristan Boyer hopes more can be done to protect players. \u201cEvery single player gets direct messages after every single match, win or lose, usually from bettors,\u201d he said to CLAY. \u201cTheoretically, ATP has a programme that deletes them for you, but sometimes it doesn\u2019t work. They\u2019re trying but hopefully they fix that.\u201d<\/p>\n