Novak Djokovic’s tirade against the Wimbledon crowd after his Round of 16 match, continues to be a huge point of discussion in the tennis world. However, in an attempt to milk excessive content from the already controversial incident, media houses like BBC and Sky Sports ran into big trouble. And it is the turn of the latter to be slammed on the internet.
Sky Sports has been dragged through the mud on X too for their erratic reporting. Sky tried to take advantage of the incident by misquoting Djokovic’s speech deliberately to spice things up and increase their viewership.
In a now-deleted tweet, Sky Sports wrote that Djokovic called himself a ‘great player’ during that rant of his towards the crowd. But the 7-time Wimbledon champion never called himself great in the first place. He meant that he was an example among those players who have been unfairly disrespected by the British crowd.
This is what Djokovic actually said – “To all those people that have chosen to disrespect a player, in this case me, have a ‘Gooooood Night'”.
After Sky Sports put out that tweet, fans did not spare them.
I think they made a mistake, wouldn’t say they intentionally did it
But they should correct themselves
— Angel Gabriel (@angelgabbyamato) July 10, 2024
Who knows?♀️
Hundreds of fans began telling them about their ‘mistake’ a day and a half ago.
They have since been hit with a damning community note…and they STILL haven’t deleted or corrected it.— Essex Girl (@rhondaessexgirl) July 10, 2024
It will be a gooooood Wimbledon final Novak will win.
— @elaco5 (@elaco5) July 11, 2024
he said “a player”, not “a great player”
— Djoker en el Sur ▫️ ge®️Ⓜ️️n (@SurDjoko) July 10, 2024
The big problem with such a blatant error by a huge media house like Sky Sports is that those who hadn’t watched the live broadcast would’ve easily believed it. As a result, that would have resulted in Djokovic getting further negative publicity for no reason.
This Sky Sports fiasco followed the BBC already copping a lot of criticism because of their mostly negative coverage of Djokovic. The most recent one was of host Clare Balding indirectly commenting that Novak Djokovic overreacted to the crowd’s chants since they were meant for the ‘underdog’ in that match, Holger Rune.
However, John McEnroe put Balding in her place and he was later joined by others in the tennis community who lauded Djokovic for giving it back to the crowd, regardless of the champion player that he is. Some have even dug up an old tweet from 2014 to prove their point about Balding being biased.
Adding to the support he is receiving, Djokovic’s ‘Gooooood night’ jibe might have done the former World No.1 two huge favors.
Djokovic’s Wimbledon Outburst Might Not Be Forgotten Anytime Soon
Firstly, Djokovic is one player who gets furious when poked deliberately. But, according to Nick Kyrgios, the Serb just goes on to play better with anything negative directed at him since he has now embraced being the ultimate crowd villain.
Secondly, the jibe is now spreading like wildfire and has now become quite a viral sensation. Of all the controversies Djokovic has been part of throughout his career, it will be interesting to see if he is only associated with the ‘Goooood Night’ comment from now on.
In his next match against Lorenzo Musetti, Djokovic can now expect more boos coming his way. Many Brits like Balding have already pointed out the humor associated with Musetti’s surname, which rhymes part-phonetically with ‘boooo’.
The hype for this match is at an all-time high now. Djokovic plays Musetti on Friday afternoon ET in the second semi-final, after Carlos Alcaraz plays Daniil Medvedev in the first.
