Memo the Australian Open: next time, maybe test IQs and tone deafness before admitting tennis players to your tournament.
The scarcely believable whining since players went into hard lockdown ahead of the Open shone a revealing light on the sense of entitlement of many top players, earning them stingingbackhanders from the Australian public.
The roll of dishonour includes Novak Djokovic, Roberto Bautista Agut ("it's like being in prison – with wifi"), Alize ("this is insane") Cornet and Paula Badosa, who whinged about having to go into quarantine and then tested positive – completely justifying the precautions.
Let's not forget Australia's own Ash Barty, sprung in a Melbourne supermarket without a mask, a breach of rules. She promised to do better. Well, that's all right then. Here, Ash, fit this long cotton wool bud up your schnozz.
Djokovic's leaked letter to authorities started things; it included some not unreasonable requests mixed with tone-deaf suggestions like moving players out of hotel quarantine and into private homes with tennis courts.
Would you like a butler with your tennis court, sir? A diamond-encrusted smoothie maker? Can we polish the avocados before delivery? And what should we do with the people who actually live in these homes? I think the Flinders St station is more for commuters, sir.
Djokovic has form in lack of forethought. He said some time back he was undecided about taking the Covid vaccine; he organised the ridiculous Adria tour when he and other players who should have known better cavorted about as if there was no virus; he and others contracted Covid-19. He had, he said, "good intentions" and the public backlash was "like a witch hunt".
Maybe Djokovic's letter was written to help others but he seems to have a complete inability to see how his comments (and actions) might appear to people who have suffered job losses and real deprivations because of Covid-19. Australian wild boy Nick Kyrgios called him a "tool" after his letter and it must be said that if Kyrgios thinks you are a tool, there is a very high probability that you are.
That said, the worst display of entitlement and graduation from the University of Marie Antoinette came from Bernard Tomic's girlfriend, Vanessa Sierra. Locked down with him, she is some sort of Instagram influencer, vlogger and former contestant on a reality show called Love Island.
I've never seen the show but I'm sure it's all very real, with complete integrity; its creator was surely joking when he described it as: "An unscripted ensemble romantic comedy about root-able characters from a diversity of backgrounds hoping to find love, connection and adventure in a sexy and aspirational setting."
They're probably hoping to find hairdressers, too. Sierra told us about the worst part of quarantine: "I don't wash my own hair. I've never washed my own hair. It's just not something that I do. I normally have hairdressers that do it twice a week for me."
She predictably copped a hiding of heroic proportions but defended her position, saying she had given "tens of thousands of dollars" to people who had to wash their own hair – sorry, sorry… lost their jobs – during Covid.
Quarantine Zone staff are seen sanitising tennis court fixtures immediately after players finish their training session at Melbourne Park. Photo / Getty
She also claimed her remarks were taken out of context before saying how she'd struggled with mental health after her Love Island gig saw her in hospital. It was easy, she said, to take a few seconds of out-of-context comment from a 10-minute vlog of lockdown where she was just being "light-hearted".
So I watched the whole, banal thing: "They're just two single beds [pushed together] – really shitty because when I sleep, I just fall in the hole. We order Uber Eats – we just don't eat that [hotel] food because it's shit. We spend about $200 a day on food. They don't clean the room and we don't get fresh sheets. I have never pooed in front of Bernard – I haven't broken that barrier in the relationship yet."
Good to know. Uh, Vanessa…the loo has a door. We recommend gently closing it. Bernard probably agrees. The flush is that shiny silver button, just in case someone usually does that for you…
Okay, Sierra isn't a tennis star though she does a good job of representing the air of superiority exhibited by some players in this episode.
How do some players and hangers-on develop such huge degrees of ignorance, inability to read a room and to sense-check comments to see how someone who isn't a globetrotting tennis star might interpret them?
Djokovic recently quit as the head of the ATP Players Council to launch a breakaway players' body. Now he has a much bigger and more urgent task – changing the image of elite tennis players from that of unseeing and unthinking plonkers who think the world turns only for them.
