Tennys Sandgren: "It's sad and brutal at the same time"
The American Tennys Sandgren absolutely disagrees with the USTA's decision not to allow special permission for Novak Djokovic at the US Open.
by Stefan Bergmann
last edit: Aug 27, 2022, 02:04 am
Tennys Sandgren is certainly not known for his binding and conflict-free statements: The American is not looking for compromises during his tennis career, likes to offend and stands with absolute conviction for his sometimes quite extreme opinions - whether rightly or not is not in the eye of the beholder and every tennis fan must clarify this for themselves. If you want to deal with the thoughts of the 31-year-old, you have to be able to deal with topics such as xenophobia or homophobia quite painlessly.
Already at the beginning of August, when it became clear that the Serbian Novak Djokovic would probably not be able to compete at the US Open in New York due to his missing Covid 19 vaccination, the man from Tennessee jumped to support the ex-world number one Page and demanded at least an exemption for the 21-time Grand Slam champion from Southeast Europe. As we know today, nothing came of it - from Sandgren's point of view a huge scandal for the "white sport".
"Maybe some glad Novak isn't there"
In an interview with L'Equipe, the former world number 41 explained. also why he doesn't want to skimp on criticism of the US Tennis Association (USTA): "You [USTA, note] shouldn't make us believe that you have no power and your vote doesn't count. The US Open is a Such a huge event that it was able to take place in September 2020 while all other events were cancelled. So the US Open is defeated for Novak. It's sad and brutal at the same time."
Tennis is by nature a selfish and individual sport: "Everyone only thinks about their interests. As soon as such problems arise, everyone shuts up. I find that sad. Maybe some are happy that Novak isn't there now..." Sandgren himself positioned himself as an opponent of vaccination from the start and has not taken up any immunization himself.