Recently, Amarissa Toth has become the talk of town out of nowhere. In the first round of the WTA Hungarian Open, the 20-year-old local player’s unsportsmanlike conduct disappointed the fans. Along with the fans, former and current players of the WTA tour raised their voices.
The tennis world came together to call out Toth’s conduct, while Zhang Shuai was robbed of a point. Among those, Victoria Azarenka‘s comment stood out.
Victoria Azarenka calls out Hungarian player’s unethical conduct
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During her first round encounter against Zhang Shuai, there were two instances of Toth’s ungrateful demeanor. In an unsportsmanlike move, she rubbed off the ball mark before her opponent could point it out to the umpire to overturn the call. Shuai was massively jeered by the crowd and broke down when she couldn’t handle the crowd pressure.
The Chinese star ended up retiring. When she walked out of the court, instead of acknowledging her, Toth started celebrating wildly, which was severely looked down upon.
This is so heartbreaking, she called the physio and I think she just couldn't handle the pressure and the feelings as she started crying so she retired from the match, the reaction from the crowd and especially Toth, loss for words. She didn't deserve to be treated like this 😪 pic.twitter.com/QVzqgPO7yy
— LorenaPopa 🕵️♀️🎾 (@popalorena) July 18, 2023
Victoria Azarenka was not pleased at all. She took to Twitter to raise her voice and call out the Hungarian for her demeanor.
The Belarussian quoted the clip of the incident and said, “That’s another level of unsportsmanlike conduct, Just wow“. The veteran’s response shows the magnitude of Toth’s unsportsmanlike conduct.
That’s another level of unsportsmanlike conduct
Just wow https://t.co/bDFQwGiPd5— victoria azarenka (@vika7) July 19, 2023
Azarenka was not the only player to call out the Hungarian youngster. Plenty of WTA players used their social media to express support towards Zhang Shuai.
Other WTA players calling out the Hungarian
Daria Saville was the first player to call out Toth. She suggested that this incident will ruin her reputation for good.
Toth "won" this point and "won" this match but her reputation is ruined……….. 🤢🤮🤢🤮
— Daria Saville (@Daria_gav) July 18, 2023
Donna Vekic joined in soon and looked completely surprised. She exclaimed, “OMG” while quoting the clip.
— Donna Vekic (@DonnaVekic) July 18, 2023
Daria Kasatkina showed her contempt towards Toth. She quoted the viral Twitter video with a rat emoticon.
— Daria Kasatkina (@DKasatkina) July 19, 2023
Anastasia Potapova shared the incident on her Instagram story. She wrote a short message in support of Zhang Shuai and made a point that the opponent should not have reacted in this manner.
more people on the case pic.twitter.com/3RLbnpQ59w
— rowan (@rowakina) July 19, 2023
In fact, Maria Sakkari went one step further and asked for Toth to be banned while calling Zhang Shuai ‘the nicest player on the tour’.
@zhangshuai121 is the nicest player on the tour!! That Toth girl should be banned from the tour 👎🏼👎🏼👎🏼 https://t.co/N9QLPDbLDX
— Maria Sakkari (@mariasakkari) July 19, 2023
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To see the entire tennis world united for an incident that took place in round one of a WTA 250 shows that Toth’s gesture was not a good look by any means.
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Where would you rank this incident among the most unsportsmanlike conduct in tennis history? Do let us know in the comments.
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