by Under the lights in front of a packed Rod Laver Arena crowd, domestic violence was finally brought to the forefront of the conversation at the Australian Open.
No, Alexander Zverev, who is due to go on trial in May, was not in court. Instead, turned broadcaster Jelena Dokic, herself a survivor of domestic abuse, conducted the post-match interview with Aryna Sabalenka. She took matters into her own hands and asked Sabalenka to sign a towel, adding: “We will auction it for children and women affected by domestic violence.”
It was a short but powerful moment from a woman who revealed her experience of physical violence and abuse by her father in 2017, with a cloud still hanging over this competition.
On Friday, Olympic champion Zverev will compete for a place in the Australian Open final. His progress at this event brought to life the nightmare scenario that tennis executives feared.
News broke last week that the world No 6 will face a public trial in Germany next May on allegations of domestic violence. This is the latest in a series of claims made against Zverev, all of which he has consistently denied.
Should he win the title on Sunday, his off-court situation will escalate into a full-blown PR disaster for the ATP and Tennis Australia. Regardless, his run in Melbourne has drawn sharp attention to tennis’s lack of domestic violence policy.
Dokic’s decision to investigate the matter on Thursday was entirely on his own. It was a message to the powers that be that the sport has dragged its feet, instead of finalizing a code that would deal with this Zverev situation.
When news of his upcoming trial was published, the ATP told Telegraph Sport, “we are aware of the upcoming legal trial involving Alexander Zverev, and we will not be commenting until that process is complete” . Legally, they are in a sticky situation, as they have failed to introduce any guidelines that would give them the power to ban a player from competing on such grounds.
Allegations of domestic abuse have followed Zverev for nearly four years. First Olya Sharypova, a former Russian player and his girlfriend, alleged that Zverev physically and emotionally abused her during their relationship, including claims that he beat her at the 2019 ATP Masters in Shanghai. Russian media published her allegations in 2020 and later by Slate magazine, although she did not pursue any legal avenues against Zverev who called her allegations ‘false’ in a statement.
At the time Andy Murray, among others, asked the ATP to implement a domestic abuse policy. The ATP has repeatedly said they are in the process of delivering one but, more than three years later, that is yet to come.
Sport is not known as a proactive space for dealing with issues of gender violence, but the ATP does not have to look too far to find domestic violence policies that exist in various leagues. The NFL is the most high profile, following several cases where players have been accused of assault or violent behavior off the field. Their policy now allows the league to place players on paid leave if they are formally charged with a felony or a crime of violence. Players can still be disciplined even if they are not legally convicted of any crime, because the evidence obtained from the NFL’s internal investigations can be enough to prove that their policy was violated.
The men’s tennis tour does not yet have such rules. It took almost a year after Sharypova first made her allegations public for the ATP to commission an investigation in late 2021. That took 15 months and in January 2023 it was found that there was “insufficient evidence to support published allegations of abuse establish”. Zverev cooperated fully with the investigation – even handing over phone records – but, crucially, he was free to continue playing.
During that time he failed to reach the final of the majors, but played in four semi-finals over the past three seasons. It’s no surprise that he is now in fifth place, two wins away from the biggest title of his career.
He will do so while dealing with formal legal proceedings, which relate to a second set of allegations from ex-girlfriend and mother of his daughter Brenda Patea. She alleges that he choked her during an argument in 2020. She reported the incident to the police in October 2021, and a German judge found enough evidence to issue a penalty order in November 2023 for Zverev to pay a fine of 450,000 euros cutting.
Zverev called the penalty order “total bull—-” and the upcoming trial is the result of an appeal against that decision. His case will be played out over 10 days in court, starting in May and overlapping with both the French Open and Wimbledon. Although he is not required to appear in Berlin for the trial, Zverev could enter the next two majors with a court case going on in the background.
To add another question to the mix, last month Zverev was also elected by his fellow players to the ATP Players Council. It means he could have input into the ATP’s plans for domestic abuse policy.
One tennis insider told Telegraph Sport that he felt the ATP “went on the chin” by allowing Zverev to be appointed to the players’ council, and felt sorry for the many players who were asked to comment. make this terrible situation during the early days. Australian Open.
Women’s World No 1 Iga Swiatek was asked to weigh in, and said: “I think it’s up to ATP what they decide. It’s certainly not good when a player facing charges like that is promoted.”
Engaged tennis fans are also affected. “As someone paying hundreds of $ for a seat on RLA [Rod Laver Arena] tomorrow night I can’t tell you how disappointed I am that Zverev is playing,” wrote someone on X, responding to the official Australian Open account that posted the order of play for Zverev’s third round match last week. “What on earth??? Why are you stressing about this person??”
Zverev’s case is a perfect example of why we need to take domestic violence as seriously as we do doping or cheating. Bans happen all the time within tennis, even with appeal processes underway, to protect the integrity of the sport.
But what about that integrity now? Tennis is being given a bad name, as a man embroiled in serious legal proceedings is about to lift one of the sport’s most important trophies.
If Daniil Medvedev knocks Zverev out of the tournament on Friday, relief should not be the overall feeling among tennis executives. There is no end to this storm, and it was one they should have seen coming.
