Tennis News: Maria Sharapova and Arthur Fils

Many tennis fans might know a lot about the Maria Sharapova story. She began playing young, as many tennis professionals do, but she also won Wimbledon when she was only 17 years old. Part of the reason for her success was she moved from Russia to the United States to train when she was still very young. But she might not have made the move except that her father received some advice from one of the best players ever.

That player was Martina Navratilova who had noticed Sharapova's skill early on. Sharapova's father, Yuri, had spoken with Navratilova about what might be best for the family and Navratilova mentioned moving Maria to Florida to train. Maria and her father left Russia and Maria's mother, Yelena, stayed behind.

In a recent discussion with Bloomberg, Sharapova spoke of how she knew her family was different from most families where she was born and she felt fortunate to be able to make the move. Sharapova called it a "dream." And maybe her five-time Grand Slam-winning career would not have happened except for some advice from Navratilova.

Maria Sharapova gets some help and Arthur Fils lets go of some frustration

Arthur Fils is definitely one of the better young players on the ATP tour though he hasn't quite become consistent enough to make deep runs in tournaments and be a real threat to move up into the top ten anytime soon. Plus, he made some odd tournament decisions in early 2024. Instead of playing some European hardcourt events, he instead chose to play on clay at the Chile Open.

Like many players at the event, he quickly learned he had made a mistake in participating. The court was so bad that there were dead spots so when a player hit one of those spots, the ball would simply become lifeless. One might wonder if some players were trying to consistently hit those spots. While Fils did make the quarterfinals at the tournament, he was also extremely upset about the court condition and took his frustration out on a supervisor.

You can watch the video of Fils screaming at a supervisor here (warning as there is some harsh language) and Fils does mention he spoke with the supervisor about the court prior to the tournament starting in the video, but he also asks the supervisor if he "is a f**king athlete." The problem is that while South America obviously has great tennis fans, if their events cannot be held on good courts then the ATP tour will not hold high-end events on the continent.

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