Patrick McEnroe, the respected tennis commentator and head of the USTA’s player development program, took exception to Donald Young, a 21-year-old relative unknown, who went on Twitter and blasted the organization for not giving him a wild-card slot to the French Open. Young, who’s received at least 13 wild-card slots from the USTA in recent years, was given the same chance as everyone else: Win a specific qualifying tournament and you’re in; lose and you’re guaranteed nothing. Well, Young lost in the finals of that qualifying tournament on Friday, and then he went on Twitter and lost his head:
“(Expletive) USTA! Their full of (expletive)! They have (expletive) me for the last time!” Young wrote shortly after his loss to Tim Smyczek.
McEnroe felt quite strongly that Young was biting the hand that feeds him, and he called on Young to apologize. Otherwise, the USTA would break off the relationship.
“I’m offended for people on our team that have worked very hard,” McEnroe said. “When he said what he said, it was taken quite personally by members of the player development team. I think Donald should apologize for what he said. At that point, we can all move on.”
Young did apologize – sort of. And naturally he did it on Twitter.
“That tweet was out of character. ive never been like that before. but im tired of it. sry about the language, but not the thought behind it.”
Soon thereafter Young closed his Twitter account.
He can still qualify for the French Open by going through the qualifying tournament in Paris the week before. Young has made it to the third round of a Grand Slam tournament only once, and just recently he cracked the Top 100 in men’s tennis. So, yeah, the USTA has obviously been holding him back.
“We would like to at least feel like we get, ‘Hey, thanks for helping me out,”‘ McEnroe said. “Unfortunately, we haven’t heard that enough, if at all. I’m not going to go into details, but suffice to say, this wasn’t just one tweet that a youngster made in being ticked off. This is the tip of the iceberg, basically.”
(Source: The Globe and Mail)