The incident took place in the third qualifying round of the US Open 2022. At that time, Sara Bejlek, ranked 194 in the world, defeated British opponent Heather Watson, ranked 157, with the scores 3-6, 6-4 and 7- 5.
After shaking hands with the opponent and the referee, Sara headed to the stands to celebrate with her father Jaroslav Bejlek and coach Jakub Kahoun. In the video that went viral on social media, Mr. Jaroslav hugged his daughter affectionately, then repeatedly patted her butt and kissed her on the mouth. Coach Jakub does the same thing.
The controversial gesture between Sara and the father.
The video angered the online community. “There’s absolutely no reason to touch a 16-year-old girl’s butt like that. It’s no longer appropriate,” “Things are getting worse as the video goes viral,” said one social media user. comment group.
“The World Women’s Tennis Association needs to look at these things in particular because female tennis players travel with a mostly male team from a very young age. They can also be the father of the player, but Even so, you shouldn’t touch a girl’s butt,” the fan commented.
Some say the close relationship between father and son is “quite common in the Czech Republic”. Another user added that hugging is “completely normal in some cultures and families”.
In the face of mixed reactions from the public, Sara assured that such action would not happen again. The 16-year-old said: “Of course I watched the video. It was a natural situation for us. It seemed inconvenient and awkward to some people, but I discussed it with my father and the coach. That won’t happen again.”
“My father will always be my father, and the coach has been with me since I was 8 years old. If this happened in the Czech Republic, almost no one would notice, but we are in the US so everyone pay more attention. Like we said, we won’t let that happen again,” Sara said.
After qualifying, Sara lost 1-6, 3-6 to 35th Ludmilla Samsonova in the first round. She left with a bonus of $80,000, nearly double the entire amount of the previous bonus.
Duy Minh – Zing.vn | 22:10 August 31, 2022
