Trust Qinwen Zheng to not bother about winning popularity contests. She is here to be the best player in the world, even if many in the tennis community are waiting to take shots at her. Zheng proved this yet again by making her stance clear about her friendships on the WTA Tour.
Recently, Aryna Sabalenka and Iga Swiatek showed that they are the new BFFs in town, with multiple posts highlighting their bonding. That might have made a journalist question Zheng about her equations with fellow tennis players. However, Zheng was razor sharp, answering the query fearlessly.
Zheng said that she is very sensitive and emotional. So it is better she keeps a distance from them, as they are her competitors at the end of the day. The Chinese star cited a situation of screaming in ecstasy when winning a point. For her, that would be super weird if she was also friends off-court with her opponent.
The reigning Olympic champion drew her line between playing intensely on a tennis court alongside being in the locker room, in contrast to having a life outside the sport where she has friends. When further prodded about her relations with her seven rivals at the WTA Finals in Riyadh, Zheng admitted that she is respectful to all of them without going overboard. She was quoted as saying,
“We are just saying hello. Sometimes say congrats to your great season. No more talk with no more people. I never go for more. I don’t try to go for more, as well, yeah.”
Qinwen Zheng tries to keep her distance from the other women on tour because it would be difficult for her to compete against a friend, ‘I decided don’t try to make a friend on tour because there’s so many people outside of the tennis world.. I come here to compete with them, to… pic.twitter.com/WV93yJfWBI
— The Tennis Letter (@TheTennisLetter) November 1, 2024
It is fascinating Zheng mentioned all this since her ‘cold handshakes’ have often made the news more than her rise in the sport. It seems as if the 7th seed in the WTA Tour Finals is perhaps the most misunderstood at the moment, maybe because she doesn’t come across as too friendly on the court. This is even though she has a passionate fanbase in China, a country that revers Olympians and champions.
Zheng’s classy reply at the Olympics to Emma Navarro’s allegations was full of heart
Zheng defeated the rising American star at the Olympics 2024, en route to her gold medal win. But it looked as if Navarro didn’t take the loss well and slammed the Chinese No.1 for having poor sportsmanship. She was quoted as saying in the post-match press conference:
“I just told her I didn’t respect her as a competitor.
“I think she goes about things in a pretty cut-throat way. It makes for a locker room that doesn’t have a lot of camaraderie, so it’s tough to face an opponent like that, who I really don’t respect.”
Those were some interesting choice of words, which showed that Navarro was not in favor of Zheng’s apparent ‘aloofness’ with the rest of the WTA Tour. However, when it was Zheng’s turn to respond, the US Open semifinalist had nothing to say to it afterward.
“Navarro told me she doesn’t know how I have a lot of fans. It looks like she’s not happy with my behavior towards her. If she’s not happy about my behavior, she can come and tell me. I would like to correct it to become a better player and a better person. I’m glad that she told me that. I will not consider it an attack because she lost the match,” Zheng said at the time.
One can expect fireworks from Zheng, who is drawn alongside the current World No.1 Aryna Sabalenka, ex-Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina, and 2024 Wimbledon finalist Jasmine Paolini for the year-ending tournament in Riyadh. The Zheng vs Sabalenka match is scheduled for Saturday, 2nd November, not before 11 AM ET, and will be live-streamed on the Tennis Channel.
