{{ubiquityData.prevArticle.description}}
{{ubiquityData.nextArticle.description}}
Naomi Osaka, the world No 2 in tennis, has been praised and criticised in relatively equal measure for the stance she took at the French Open. Seemingly oblivious to the good old-fashioned courtesies of a championship which started in 1891, she had earlier released a statement to say she would be skipping the usual media obligations. They were too stressful. Then, amid the ensuing hullabaloo, she pulled out of the tournament altogether.
Fellow players initially backed the media. However, the tide began to turn when Osaka put more of an emphasis on her mental health. As officialdom adopted a somewhat heavy-handed approach, fining her $15,000 and threatening her with expulsion from the Grand Slam event, Serena Williams said she wanted to give the player a hug.
Osaka has opened a debate that’s relevant to golf. Pia Nilsson and Lynn Marriott of Vision54, who put the emphasis on “human skills” with their instruction, believe mental health issues are by no means confined to tennis. They are seeing more social anxiety instances in golf.
Back in 2010, Nilsson and Marriott lent support to Japan’s Ai Miyazato, a player who is no less of a superstar in her native land than Osaka. She needed Vision54’s help in coping with media requests, not least when it came to the kind of negative and personal questions Osaka deplores.
“Our experience today is that players need more support than ever, not just with their golf but their well-being,” Nilsson says. “The current generation have an additional challenge on their plates: They are expected to be influencers on social media and, at the same time, they are being bombarded with comments, opinions, criticisms and expectations. It’s 24/7 and, quite frankly, it can exhaust them.
“Many are young stars and they still haven’t matured in being ‘safe’ in who they are. They don’t yet have the ability to have strong and healthy boundaries. They need more training and support to manage their game, their lives, the media, the sponsors, the fans, etc.”
Meanwhile, European Ryder Cup captain Pádraig Harrington is at the opposite end of the spectrum to Osaka. He finds talking to the press “therapeutic.” In the days when he was still a regular winner, he used to say he could spill out his feelings at the same time as he was talking through his rounds.
Yet Harrington noted even then that there were problems afoot among young players who were arriving on tour with the mindset they were going to be “snitched out” by the media. He wondered who was behind it. Was it other players who had been on tour for five minutes longer than they had, or was it a warning from someone in their team?
He also recognised how lucky he had been in being reared in Ireland, a mad-keen golfing land where, because he was making headlines from age 13 or 14, he became comfortable with members of the press.
Lee Westwood and Tommy Fleetwood are two more naturals in this area of the modern game, as is reigning AIG Women’s British Open champion Sophia Popov. When Popov lost in the final of the recent Bank of Hope LPGA Match-Play, the tears which had accompanied her winning putt at Troon made a brief return as she came out on the losing side of a magnificent final with Ally Ewing. Yet, 30 seconds later, when asked to speak to the Golf Channel, the tears were overtaken by that wonderful smile, along with an apology for being so emotional, and she gave a thoroughly comprehensive interview.
Michelle Wie has made an always-charming fist of handling an Osaka-like level of publicity, while Inbee Park is an absolute joy in the press room. She gives careful consideration to every question that comes her way.
Yet there is no getting away from the fact that, with the floodgates having been opened on the mental-health front, problems with access will just as surely erupt in golf as they have in tennis.
In the days of, say, a Herbert Warren Wind or a Pat Ward-Thomas, a beautifully couched sentence about 2-irons flying quail high to distant greens would have been enough to merit an approving nod from your average sports editor.
Osaka can not be expected to shoulder all the blame for what has happened any more than she can be excused from media duties. Were the latter to be allowed, others would in no time at all be making a case – real or imagined – for themselves.
Meanwhile, media people like myself have had to adapt to some unlovely changes in our line of business.
In the days of, say, a Herbert Warren Wind or a Pat Ward-Thomas, a beautifully couched sentence about 2-irons flying quail high to distant greens would have been enough to merit an approving nod from your average sports editor. Not any more. Now, even the broadsheets are the proverbial wolves in sheep’s clothing as they expect correspondents to pick up on the tabloid tales of the day. Such is the steady stream of redundancies in the newspaper world that writers comply.
Mind you, there are other scenarios in which the players are not wrong in thinking members of the media don’t necessarily deserve their respect.
Take, for instance, what happened at the recent Monte Carlo Tennis Classic after a first-round match in which Poland’s Hubert Hurkacz beat Thomas Fabbiano of Italy
The media asked for an interview and, when Hurkacz sat down in front of them, whoever had brought him along did her bit to set things in motion when she asked if they would start with questions in English. When there were none, the same person moved on to ask for questions in Polish. Faced with a second deathly silence, Hurkacz went on his way. He looked bemused but is that how he felt on the inside?
To be fair to golf, those at the helm would have employed the services of a professional moderator who would have had a handful of questions at the ready for precisely such a situation.
Maybe Osaka would like to add that incident to her hit-back material in the discussion she has offered to have with officialdom after the French Open.
It is a discussion which should make for a sensible second step, though who knows what we can expect thereafter. As Nilsson says, “Players, coaches, media and sponsors are all in this together.”
Top: Naomi Osaka cited mental health for her decision not to speak to the media and ultimately withdraw from the French Open.
E-Mail Lewine