American tennis legend Pam Shriver has called for Wimbledon winner Elena Rybakina to find a replacement for her under-fire coach.
On Thursday, Rybakina defeated Victoria Azarenka to earn herself a spot in the Australian Open final where she would go on to lose to Aryna Sabalenka.
Rybakina’s win over Azarenka was overshadowed by her coach Stefano Vukov, who was captured on the broadcast yelling at the Kazakh tennis star and pointing at his head.
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Vukov defended his actions in the wake of the incident, explaining that footage of his outburst lacked context.
That didn’t stop Shriver from criticising Vukov in the midst of Saturday night’s Australian Open decider.
She tweeted, “As I watch Rybakina try to win her second major in 7 months, I hope she finds a coach who speaks and treats her with respect at ALL times and does not ever accept anything less.”
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Shriver received a mixture of replies, and when it was suggested by one user that Rybakina was happy, wrote, “Happy with not being treated respectfully… hmmm not a good pattern for life.”
Dmitry Tursunov, who reached a career-high No.20 in the men’s singles world rankings, was among those to respond to Shriver’s claim.
“Pam, I have respected you as an entity in tennis but lately I’ve seen you write a lot of questionable things,” the Russian player-turned-coach wrote.
“This one has to top it off. In your quest to vilify random people in tennis for odd reasons, you have openly and publicly insulted a man who is solely responsible for the fact that you even know who Elena Rybakina is.
“You have zero clue what you are talking about and at the very least owe a public apology to a man who is a great coach in every sense of that word.
“You’d be lucky to ever reach that level and every player would be lucky to have someone like that in their corner.
“The man is loyal to his player with every atom of his body and soul. It’s a shame you have proved time and time again that you are blind to see anything than bunch of gestures.”
Shriver gave a terse response of her own.
“You really think I would tweet if it was only about gestures? His words, his actions and his manner towards a young player, often are disrespectful and most people have noticed it,” she continued.
“45 years in the game seeing and experiencing just about everything and I don’t know what I am talking about?”
Shriver reached No.3 in women’s singles, was world No.1 in doubles, and turned to commentary after her career.
Her illustrious career included 21 doubles grand slam wins and an Olympic gold medal in doubles.
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