Roland Garros 2021 (aka French Open) is well underway and the biggest headline, so far, is not an upset (although Thiem did go out in R1 👀). The biggest, and I believe the most important piece of news, is Naomi Osaka's withdrawal from the tournament. If the name doesn’t ring a bell, Noami Osaka is a Japanese professional tennis player with 4 grand slam titles and the current world no. 2 in the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) rankings. 

I should firstly mention that all professional tennis players, both men and women, are required to attend press conferences, both pre and post-matches, during the tour. I bet you knew this already but if not this won't sound surprising to you. It's common to many sports anyway. 

But now it becomes a bit interesting. Have you ever considered that press conferences may put immense pressure on the athletes? They should think on the spot what to say, how to say it, they need to be careful not to say anything to the public they may regret in the future and at the same time smile and be happy for the press and the fans. Imagine, everyday, after work that you go to a room with a bunch of journalists answering all different sorts of questions - from who you went to dinner with the night before to how you think the next task (or match) needs to be approached whilst being live streamed to the world. Don't you now think that it's too much? What if some questions are way too personal to share or simply you don't feel like going to such press conferences and want to leave? Tennis players don't have the option...

Naomi said many times in the past that she's an introvert and obviously doesn't like to be the centre of attention and surrounded by media and flashes. It's no surprise that she uses her headphones as a means of distraction from the outer world, something which she also admitted on Twitter.
 

Image from this Tennis Majors article

So what actually happened? In the start of the French Open Naomi announced that she wouldn’t be doing press conferences in Paris due to the mental health impact and the unfair burden on players. This has lead the Roland Garros organisers to charge her $15,000 for skipping the first-round press conference. And from there, it escalated pretty quickly both in the tennis world but also on social media. 

I can sympathise with Osaka when she says she feels anxious about getting up in front of the media and of course mental health is not a joke, it is real and serious. It also takes a lot of courage to do what she did.  Questions at such press conferences can often be repetitive and boring but, at the same time, they can be overwhelming for introverts - plus I'm pretty sure they also have better things to do.

From the journalists' perspective, they are doing their job as well and speaking directly to the athletes is the most creditable and reliable source of information for them. Hence, I can feel for them a bit if the tennis players start skipping press conferences.

So I believe both sides should have handled it differently and... better. When you sign up for a tennis tournament you agree to certain rules, including press conferences. Media availability, therefore, is part of the tournament - you can't enforce your own rules. On the other hand, the French Open organisers and all the other organisers as well as the ATP and WTA should take mental health more seriously and listen to the athletes, because they are the ones that make them, who they are 🧠🎾.

If players don't like the press conferences they should be allowed to communicate with reporters either via representatives or via some sort of instant messaging. Options should be there...so let's see what will be done in the future.

But for now I'm leaving you with Naomi's tweet on the whole incident