Olympic duo in nasty fall-out with best player in world branded ‘insincere’

Olympic tennis stars Iga Swiatek and Danielle Collins had a nasty fall-out on Wednesday, with the Polish world No.1 branded ‘insincere’ by her opponent.

Swiatek is the best female tennis player in the world and is dominant across the WTA Tour, especially on clay, having won the French Open for three straight years.

The 23-year-old currently has an incredible tally of 11,005 ranking points – which is 2832 more than the world No.2 Coco Gauff – showing just how strong she is.

Swiatek has been caught up in controversy, though, after Team USA star Collins slammed her following their tense quarter-final showdown at Roland-Garros.

During the match, Collins told Swiatek to ‘play at the server’s pace’ after the Polish star held up her hand to halt the American’s service motion.

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Collins later appeared to hit Swiatek with the ball – and the world No.1 was also jeered onto the court for taking a long break at the end of the second set.

The American eventually retired to hand Swiatek victory – and following a heated exchange on the court – Collins ripped into the top-seed in her press conference.

‘I told Iga she didn’t have to be insincere about, you know, my injury,’ Collins said.

‘There’s a lot that happens on camera, and there are a lot of people with a ton of charisma and come out and are one way on camera and another way in the locker room.

‘And I just haven’t had the best experience, and I don’t really feel like anybody needs to be insincere. They can be the way that they are. I can accept that, and I don’t need the fakeness.’

Swaitek has issued a response and has insisted that she has no idea where Collins is coming from.

‘I won’t argue about it, because I’ve never done anything unpleasant towards her,’ Swiatek said. ‘I just wanted to congratulate her on her successful career, because we all know that this is her last year on tour.

‘Honestly, I don’t know what she meant because we didn’t even have any interactions that could have caused her to say that to me.

‘Generally speaking, during tournaments, when we go out and have time to change our clothes, we are entitled to five minutes. Here I asked the lady who escorted me how much time I had. She didn’t tell me that.

‘She replied that they don’t count time here and that I should just leave when I feel like it. So I used this time to change and cool down, and then I returned to the court.

‘I honestly didn’t know how much time had passed, but I didn’t do anything against the rules, so I don’t really know what the whole situation was about.’

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