KEY BISCAYNE, Fla. (AP) -- Serena Williams says a heckler bothered her throughout her match Monday at the Sony Ericsson Open, making at least one racist remark before he was finally ejected.

"The guy said, `Hit the net like any Negro would.' I was shocked," Williams said. "I couldn't believe it. I had to do a double take. I think I hit a double fault on that point."

Williams won the third-round match against Lucie Safarova, 6-3, 6-4. Williams complained late in the match to the chair umpire about the heckler.

"I shouldn't have let it bother me, because growing up in Compton we had drive-bys," said Williams, who was raised in Los Angeles. "I guess that's what my dad prepared me for, but I'm not going to stand for it."

Fans and security confirmed a man heckled Williams inappropriately, tournament director Adam Barrett said.

"The man was identified and escorted off the site," Barrett said. "As security determines the severity of his actions, he may not be welcome to return. We take these matters very, very seriously."

Williams, an eight-time Grand Slam champion, is among the event's most popular players. She lives in South Florida, considers Key Biscayne her home tournament and has won the title three times.

With a small crowd in the stadium for her late-afternoon match, she said she could hear the heckler between points and during them.

"Every time I missed a shot or a serve, he would say, `That's the way to do it,"' she said. "He was calling, `Foot fault.' He was saying, `Hit in the net.' ... I mean, who does this? That's so elementary. You don't do this on a professional level."

Williams and her sister Venus have boycotted the Indian Wells tournament since 2001, when the family was booed after Venus withdrew just before a semifinal match against Serena. Their father, Richard, said those jeers were racially motivated.

"It's always something with me," Serena said with a laugh.

Racism again?

Do white people never get racist abuse?

I will be quite easy to copy and paste an ancient -but not so far away-(1 year ago I guess) post by you chairman at the BBC board in which you was so stupid to write that FED was a sort of Nazi Officer...

Do you remember this post Chairman?

..You should always think twice man :angry: ...But unfortunately you can not. :( .

Why don't you comment on the issue at hand instead crying wolf about racism for white people, yes it exists but didn't happen here.

Its easy to mishear things in large crowds. Sorry but it just seems like racism seems to follow them around a bit too much.


P.s. Your signature image is too large. :)

Ok, well you get out your tape measure, and measure and judge exactly what is TOO much then....o wait you already did that.

Yes well spotted re: the sig, are you a detective by any chance?

I don't need to, it says it in bold red type "Your signature is too big. Please make it 550x400 pixels or smaller. Thanks" - and there's also a vertical scrollbar which looks rather comical on a signature.

WTF??????'

TV you freak!!!!!!!

Yorkshire what is your problem? She didnt even complain until it started to affect her directly.


I used to respect you till now. Even normal booing causes people to concerntrate less and then to add coal to the fire. As soon as she reported him everyone around where the freak stood pointed him out.

On my side it was simply a reality check type of exercise...

You are with this thread pointing (correctly and I agree with that) out a disgraceful behaviour.

Still, you, few months ago, you was able to accuse one of the major player in Tennis history to be a Nazi :yikes: , i.e. what's more in term of disgraceful behaviour...

Great logic and ability of self analysis Chairman: Really smart and intelligent behaviour :bs: from your side for sure...

I mean..Really talk with you is just waste of time..So..Bye for now and for a while I hope..

Unnecessary confrontation on this thread, I think.

TV - you agree with Chairman's point on this one, can you fight out the Fed Nazi point on that thread... please (BTW - I don't remember the remark, but if said otherwise than in jest it was obviously ridiculous).

Yorkshire - you may be right that the Williams' have over-played the racism card at times - but they have also undeniably suffered racisim and it looks as though you have chosen a bade example here.

The point seems to be that there are still some vicious idiots who feel sufficiently worried about the colour of the Willams' skin to shout racist remarks at them from the crowd. That's awful, but if other members of the crowed pointed him out then we can be thankful for small mercies.

I agree.

I just think that they need to realise that most people who don't like them feel that way not because of what colour their skin is.

As the article states, both fans nearby and security staff confirmed Serena's claims, are you saying they 'misheard' too?

Also, when have they played the racism card? Did Serena play it when she got booed at RG? Nope. She didn't even do it at Indian Wells, Richard did, and now here, where someone actually did use a racist remark...

But it seems quite obvious in this instance that there was a racist idiot in the crowd, heckling Serena. He was kicked out, as he should have been. Surely you can agree with that. Or should the behaviour have been tolerated, because sometimes white people are subjected to racism, too. :wacko:

I think you'll find that Yorkshire is agreeing with both you and Dav - he accepts that what happened recently was not an example of Serena playing the racist card.

With the upbringing the Williams sisters have had, its not really a surprise that they are sensitive to this kind of thing. Their first instinct seems to be to make things into a them and us kind of situation. If they aren't for me, they must be against me.

Sorry to double post, but had more things to add and it was too late to edit.

No-one should have to put up with racist abuse in this day and age.

How many of us were at the match in question? I'm guessing not all that many. So the only people who know what actually was said were probably Serena, the alleged "heckler", and the people sitting nearby. Did the TV cameras pick anything up? If so, that would be good evidence to check over. So what do the rest of us do that weren't there? We rely on people who were there to report the information for us (the media). What is the medias prime objective? To sell their media. And what makes a good story? Racism? You bet.

But why don't you believe her? It's not as if she makes these claims in every match, in the clip where she approaches the umpire, she says to him that she's never experienced anything like this in her 10 years of playing :shrug:

Not being there, I can't be 100% sure whether it happened or it didn't.

The media aren't always known for telling the truth or the whole truth about stories.

*looks again*


No. I find that he's said:

Still sounds to me like his main point is to criticize Serena for being to sensitive and to doubt whether there was really anything racist said. That doesn't agree with me.

Looks like I was wrong Nick. There may be a point somewhere in what Yorkshire says, but he has chosen the wrong example to make it as far as I can see.

To be honest, moderator, I think that with KKK (Ku Klux Klan) being in the thread title, it was pretty obvious what kind of discussion the OP intended this to be.

I wasnt intending anything. Yorkshire your response was simply disgraceful and now you are looking for an excuse. I was pretty shocked you are the one who came up with that response considering you never cause any trouble.

Anyone who is bold enough to go on a tennis court and shout racist remarks to someone as powerful as the williams has a very huge agenda and possibly KKK, since that is the name of the racist group in the US.

More likely just an idiot.

To be frank you are right. Possibly a drunk.

Drunkenness isn't an excuse. I've said above that I'm not a racist Chairman, so you can put my lifetime KKK membership pack on hold for now.

I merely suggested that usually there are two sides to every story.

Unfortunately being a famous person makes you more susceptible to cranks.

Does this make you feel better, yorkshire??

Why would it?

I don't like bananas.

Of course, I didn't say you are ........ I here people react like that all the time who are not. I am merely saying it wasn't that right response, if that came from my mate magic, I probably wouldn't care but you sound like one of the responsible board members.

I am sorry if you got the impression that I meant you are "you know what".

No worries. I guess I have been close to the subject of racism too. My family used to visit an elderly friend who lived in a rather grim Asian estate in Bradford. We were normally the target for racist abuse ourselves, and the last few times we visited, we took it in turns to look after the car as we didn't want to leave it unattended.

I thought you were upset that the trolls had stolen your bananas. I guess I had that wrong.