Danielle Collins criticised the Australian Open crowd for their abusive behaviour during matches.
Collins used the crowd’s hostility to motivate herself, earning $320,000 by reaching the third round of the tennis Grand Slam.
She emphasised that those who booed her had contributed financially, calling it a “cool concept”.
Someone once defined a patriot as a person who loves his country, while a nationalist hates everyone else’s.
There seem to be plenty of nationalists in the crowd at the Australian Open tennis major in Melbourne and woe betide those who draw an Aussie player in theirsingles – a misfortune which the United States’ Danielle Collins highlighted with her win over Australian hopeful Destanee Aiava.
The Australian crowd’s collective nastiness is at its height in such matches and has been a feature of this and past Australian Opens. Over-excited fans forget the distinction between partisanship and poison, trying to influence the result by abuse, cheering the opposing player’s mistakes and booing, even when they are trying to serve.
Collins’ colourful dissing of the Melbourne crowd was refreshing. She let fly with a volley of exaggerated blown kisses, held her hand up to her ear in listening pose and wore a big grin as the boos rained down, mouthing “How about that?” in slow-mo so the crowd could not fail to read her lips.
She also slapped her own butt, maybe a self-administered version of the congratulatory gesture often seen in tennis – but which really seemed more like an invitation for the crowd to kiss her somewhere they normally wouldn’t.
It wasn’t just Collins either. Britain’s Jack Draper talked after beating Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis about the abuse hurled at him from spectators. Scotland’s Jacob Fearnley played and beat Nick Kyrgios – a world leader at whipping an Aussie crowd into a frenzy (if nothing else) – and suffered likewise.
However, the boo-brigade chose the wrong woman. The feisty Collins is one of the few who enjoys being ragged by a partisan crowd. Well, maybe not enjoys it, exactly, but uses it to gee herself up rather than getting into a funk.
The great John McEnroe was another – whipping himself into a frenzy over slights (real or imagined; minor or significant) to lift his play.
Collins doesn’t tolerate fools – and sometimes doesn’t even tolerate people who aren’t fools. She plays tennis with her blood somewhere close to boiling point and sometimes has what might be called a daunting RBF (resting bitch face).
Last year, after beating former world No 1 Victoria Azarenka in a WTA tournament in Rome, the spiky Collins showed her annoyance with the crowd and barked at a camera crew. An on-court interview question also provoked a sharp response; the look she gave the interviewer at the end would have curdled milk.
USA's Danielle Collins celebrates victory over Australia's Destanee Aiava after their women's singles match on day five of the Australian Open. Photo / AFP
So she isn’t always tennis’ idea of a good girl. She chose to keep trolling the Australian crowd in this week’s on-court interview and press conference, making the point that those who’d booed her (and continued to boo her through the interview) had actually helped her by contributing to her next five-star holiday (she’s earned $320,000 for making it to the third round).
“One of the greatest things about being a professional athlete is the people that don’t like you and the people that hate you, they actually pay your bills. It’s kind of a cool concept.”
Collins, 31, lost the 2022 Australian Open final to local queen Ash Barty. Against Aiava, she told the baying crowd to shut up, adding fuel to the flames before the umpire intervened, calling for more respect.
She said of partisan crowds: “I love playing in a crowd that has energy, regardless of what side they’re on. I’m somebody, too, it kind of just motivates me even more ... Every person that’s bought a ticket to come out here and heckle me or do what they do, it’s all going towards the Danielle Collins Fund.”
At the press conference, Collins was rebuked by a moderator for using too many cuss words before she was asked if she minded being cast as a villain. “All I have to say is good luck pissing someone off who really doesn’t ... can I say it?” she asked the moderator.
Told no, she said: “Good luck trying to get under the skin of somebody who doesn’t really care.”
Some Australian commentators ludicrously rebuked her for an overblown reaction, many of them the same people who say tennis must embrace partisanship and a party atmosphere if it is to attract more fans (Melbourne’s court six has a two-storey bar, which explains some of this booing nonsense).
If tennis must embrace nationalistic ninnies and alcohol-fuelled abuse then surely it must also let the chains drop from the likes of Collins and others who are perfectly able to hand it back.
We’ve all heard the predictable, saccharin-sweet “I love you” stuff directed at the crowd from tennis players in on-court interviews. How much more refreshing for Collins or someone like her to say something like: “You behaved like a bunch of drunks with no respect and no manners and I wouldn’t trust any of you to sit the right way round on the toilet.”
