{"id":840469,"date":"2026-08-02T20:23:47","date_gmt":"2026-08-02T20:23:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/840469\/"},"modified":"2026-08-02T20:23:47","modified_gmt":"2026-08-02T20:23:47","slug":"wrong-headline-tennis-legend-martina-navratilova-defends-sophie-cunningham-in-womens-sport-debate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/840469\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Wrong headline&#8217; &#8211; Tennis legend Martina Navratilova defends Sophie Cunningham in women&#8217;s sport debate"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>   <a class=\"fw\" href=\"https:\/\/profile.google.com\/cp\/Cg0vZy8xMWcxajNfc2h3\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\"> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"28\" height=\"28\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hitc.com\/wp-content\/themes\/grv-media\/img\/google-discover.svg\" alt=\"\"\/> Follow us on Google Discover <\/a>  <\/p>\n<p>Sophie Cunningham\u2019s stance on transgender athletes in women\u2019s sport has overshadowed the WNBA recently.<\/p>\n<p>The Indiana Fever star was already a big name in the United States, as she plays alongside Caitlin Clark but also models and podcasts.<\/p>\n<p>She has now become a controversial figure for saying that transgender athletes should compete against biological women.<\/p>\n<p>While many have criticised <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hitc.com\/topic\/sophie-cunningham\/\" data-type=\"post_tag\" data-id=\"100961\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Cunningham\u2019s<\/a> take, tennis legend <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hitc.com\/topic\/martina-navratilova\/\" data-type=\"post_tag\" data-id=\"98818\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Martina Navratilova<\/a> has defended her on social media.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"682\"  src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/GettyImages-2285014547-1024x682.jpg\" alt=\"Wimbledon Tennis Championships 2026 - Day 13\" \/>Photo by Ray Tang\/Anadolu via Getty ImagesWhat Martina Navratilova said in defence of Sophie Cunningham<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/us\/news\/2026\/08\/01\/sophie-cunningham-anti-trans-basketball\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">The Telegraph<\/a> recently published a story describing Sophie Cunningham as \u201cbasketball\u2019s new anti-trans MAGA poster girl\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Martina Navratilova saw the article online and corrected the newspaper with her interpretation of Cunningham\u2019s message.<\/p>\n<p>Navratilova tweeted: \u201cSophie is not anti-trans- rather, she is pro-women! Wrong headline!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The nine-time Wimbledon champion is very vocal on political issues, and she has taken issue with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hitc.com\/indiana-fever-distance-themselves-from-pro-sophie-cunningham-protests-after-recent-controversy\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"2599343\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the criticism of Cunningham<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>MORE SOPHIE CUNNINGHAM STORIES<\/p>\n<p>Many other celebrities will agree with the Indiana Fever guard\u2019s stance but feel they should not say anything.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Cunningham and Navratilova also have plenty of opposition, including former USWNT player Megan Rapinoe.<\/p>\n<p>Join Our Newsletter<\/p>\n<p>Receive exclusive football transfer news and updates twice a week to your mailbox<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Follow us on Google Discover Sophie Cunningham\u2019s stance on transgender athletes in women\u2019s sport has overshadowed the WNBA&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":840470,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,10731,17443,38559,85,747],"class_list":["post-840469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-indiana-fever","tag-martina-navratilova","tag-sophie-cunningham","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=840469"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840469\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/840470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=840469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=840469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=840469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}