Shelton moves to Australian Open semi-finals, says on-court interviewers are ‘disrespectful’

Ben Shelton of Atlanta advanced to his maiden Australian Open semi-final in Melbourne after defeating Italy’s Lorenzo Sonego 6-4, 7-5, 4-6, 7-6 (4). 

This victory marks the 22-year-old’s second Grand Slam semi-final, with his first coming at the 2023 US Open, where he lost to Novak Djokovic. 

With this win, Shelton admitted after the game: “I feel relieved right now, shoutout to Lorenzo Sonego because that was some ridiculous tennis… I’m just really happy to be through, to get my first win on Rod Laver Arena. Thanks everybody for coming out, it was one of my favourite matches of my career.” 

However, Shelton expressed his frustration with the event’s on-court interviewers, saying they were “disrespectful” towards the players. The athlete said that in his interview with former Australian Davis Cup player John Fitzgerald, he was taken aback when Fitzgerald stated that no one would be cheering him on in the semi-final because his opponent might be between defending champion Jannik Sinner or local favourite Alex De Minaur. Sinner then defeated De Minaur in straight sets at the Rod Laver Arena. 

Shelton further commented: “I’ve been a little bit shocked this week with how players have been treated by the broadcasters… I don’t think that the guy who mocked Novak [Djokovic], I don’t think that was just a single event. I’ve noticed it with different people, not just myself.”

 “There’s been a lot of negativity, and I think that’s something that needs to change,” Shelton added. 

Recently, Djokovic was also upset by the comments made by Australian broadcaster Tony Jones, who labelled him as “overrated” and a “has-been.” Due to this, Djokovic refused to do ab on-court interview after his fourth-round win over Jiri Lehecka.

Jones eventually apologized and said: “I’m disappointed it came to this because the comments were made on the news on the Friday night which I considered to be banter and humour – which is consistent with what I do… However, I was made aware on the Saturday morning from Tennis Australia, via the Djokovic camp, that the Djokovic camp was not happy at all with those comments… I immediately contacted the Djokovic camp and issued an apology to them – 48 hours ago – for any disrespect which Novak felt I had caused. As I stand here now I stand by that apology to Novak if he feels any disrespect, which he clearly does.”

Source: The Guardian