{"id":1348,"date":"2023-01-18T17:05:12","date_gmt":"2023-01-18T18:05:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/?p=1348"},"modified":"2025-06-20T11:03:01","modified_gmt":"2025-06-20T11:03:01","slug":"tennis-star-seethes-at-russian-teenager-in-hot-tempered-aus-open-showdown-video","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/18\/tennis-star-seethes-at-russian-teenager-in-hot-tempered-aus-open-showdown-video\/","title":{"rendered":"Tennis star seethes at Russian teenager in hot-tempered Aus Open showdown (VIDEO)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sixth-seed Maria Sakkari avoided an embarrassing defeat to Russian teenager Diana Shnaider<\/strong><\/p>\n

Greek tennis player Maria Sakkari made clear her objections to the nature of teenage Russian opponent Diana Shnaider\u2019s celebrations during a tense clash on Wednesday at the Australian Open. <\/p>\n

Sakkari, ranked sixth in the world, surprisingly lost the first set against the 18-year-old qualifier Shnaider and was close to defeat in the second when she announced her objection to her opponent\u2019s boisterous style of celebration throughout the match.<\/p>\n

After levelling the second at 5-5, meaning that she was just two games away from winning the match, Shnaider roared and pumped her fist into the air \u2013 all while glaring at her opponent across the court.<\/p>\n

\n

Shnaider screams; Sakkari seethes.#AusOpen<\/a>pic.twitter.com\/wGO95IBgya<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Ben Rothenberg (@BenRothenberg) January 18, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cIf she screams one more time in my face<\/em>,\u201d a fuming Sakkari could be heard on the broadcast saying.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, no, no, no, one more time\u2026 she’s coming towards me. One more time and I\u2019m going to speak to the referee<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chair umpire Christian Rask, though, appeared to dismiss Sakkari\u2019s complaints and allowed the match to progress without any warning to Shnaider for her behavior.<\/p>\n

\n

Aggro from Sakkari…<\/p>\n

“If she screams one more time in my face, I’m going to call the referee.”#AusOpen<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/FIwUhHHphi<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 The Tennis Podcast (@TennisPodcast) January 18, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Sakkari would regain her composure to claim the second set by a score of 7-5, and saw home the win with a more confident showing in the deciding third set, taking it 6-3.<\/p>\n

Afterwards, and when cooler heads seemed to have prevailed, Sakkari paid tribute to her rival\u2019s skills on the court \u2013 but described Shnaider\u2019s celebrations as being \u201cinappropriate<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not easy to play someone that you’ve never played before or seen before on the tour<\/em>,\u201d said Sakkari. <\/p>\n

\u201cI was a little bit hesitant. She was swinging very hard, she was playing very aggressive.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI think that, you know, during a match you can be very pumped or, you know, the way that some players celebrate their points, it\u2019s not appropriate<\/em>,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wasn’t happy with that. But, you know, she never did it again. That was very nice of her<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shnaider, who was playing in her first-ever Grand Slam event and who is a member of the North Carolina State Women\u2019s tennis team, previously won the girls\u2019 doubles at the 2021 Wimbledon event alongside her Belarusian partner Kristina Dmitruk, while also winning the Australian Open and US Open in 2022. <\/p>\n

She is also a two-time semifinalist in junior Grand Slam singles competitions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sixth-seed Maria Sakkari avoided an embarrassing defeat to Russian teenager Diana Shnaider Greek tennis player Maria Sakkari made clear her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1348","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1348"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1348\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1349,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1348\/revisions\/1349"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}