Where Are the Israeli Players at the Australian Open?

Where Are the Israeli Players at the Australian Open?

Seeds are what you expect to see at tournaments’ ends, and the first major of the year, the Australian Open, is true to form, with America’s top star, Coco Gauff, winner at the U.S. Open last September, on track for her second career major. The last American in the men’s draw, Taylor Fritz, made Novak Djokovic work hard in the quarters, but it will be Jannik Sinner, from Italian Tyrol, whom the defending champion will meet in the semis. That may well be the match of the home stretch, for sheer tennis beauty, but none will disappoint.

Missing will be Spanish phenom and No. 2 seed Carlos Alcaraz. The shrewd tennis analyst Gill Gross, a product of Syracuse University’s renowned communications program, picked Alcaraz to win his match and meet Daniil Medvedev in the semis; it was a reasonable pick. He picked wrong, but few expected Alexander “Sascha” Zverev to hit his forehand, normally his weakest shot, like a Roger Clemens fast ball. After two exquisite sets, 6–1, 6–3, behind a near-infallible mix of first serves and deep groundstrokes that kept the younger man on his heels, something nearly went wrong, or rather, one thing went wrong for him, and another went right for Alcaraz.

Actually, Zverev had him 5–2 in the third set, but there was a click on one side and a dip on the other, and the roles were reversed. Alcaraz found his game and his energy, came from behind, and won a tiebreak 7–2. In the fourth set they stayed close, trading breaks at the beginning. At 4–4, Zverev recovered the baseline power and depth he started out with, kept the points short, cutting off Alcaraz at the net or passing him with angles when he moved close to it.

On the ladies’ side, Coco Gauff plays defending Australian Open champ Aryna Sabalenka in the semis, having toughed it out against Marta Kostyuk in the quarters. The other semi will see Dayana Yastremska, a young qualifier from Ukraine making a dream run, against No. 12 seed Zheng Qinwen, mainland China’s top player at 21. All these are tall girls, I mean young ladies, long-limbed and lithe (Miss S is a bit on the sturdier side but quite a peach too), so additional to fantastic tennis that will be a graceful ballet.

The match between Zverev and Medvedev (the latter having won a thrilling five-setter against Wroclaw favorite Hubert Hurkacz) will be a battle of tall lithe athletes too, though, with these men’s baseline games, it will be less a ballet and more a slugging match unless Zverev finds that he can consistently attack the net without being passed. But the match to watch should be the other men’s semi, Sinner against Djokovic. Sinner is at the top of his game. He beat Rublev in a straight set wipeout. The question is: Can his placement overcome Djokovic’s resilience? Will the man of Belgrade figure out how to overcome what the Tyrolean sends at him? That is the question.

But the other question is this, and no one in the sports press seems to be raising it: Where are the Israeli tennis players?

Granted, Israel is not a great tennis country — there are plenty of excellent players in Israel, but at the pro level, not so many. Still, there usually are one of two entrants at least in many if not most of the tour’s events. So why is no one curious? Tact? They most likely are at the front, or in the rear where there is much to do also during a war. Politics and sports should not mix? I almost always make that very point, but it is still simple ordinary news to note that a country’s athletes must pass on a big event, all the more so when it is a country as well-known as Israel.

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Different but not unrelated to this lack of interest, why is no one is inquiring after Peng Shuai? Two or three years ago, she was at the center of a big scandal, a Chinese star muzzled — or worse — because she complained about being ravished and exploited by a high official in the Communist regime. The Women’s Tennis Association and other sports organizations, as well as individuals in the sports world, made a big row about this, and the Reds allowed her to have some dubious conversations during the Beijing Olympics at which she said the whole affair had been a misunderstanding, an explanation that, if anything, should have been cause for further alarm. No one has heard from her since, and all the concerned parties in the West are no longer making public expressions of concern, with the WTA quietly ending a boycott of Chinese tournaments that was supposed to last until Peng’s security was demonstrated.

Like the lack of interest, if that is what it is, in what Israeli tennis players are going through now, this is a symptom of the Free World’s short attention span, which itself is one of its perennial vulnerabilities. The West’s enemies always count on these lapses of attention and memory. Ukrainian men are not playing on the tennis tour, either; but, though this was mentioned when the defensive war against Russia began, it is no longer newsworthy.

An attractively good-natured top player on the women’s side, Ons Jabeur (who was upset in the second round), has been vocal on social media in expressing political support for the people of Gaza, with no mention of just why they find themselves in the horror through which they are living. It is disappointing to see such a nice person take a party line, but no one would think of restraining her right to express it. The Australian Open banned both Israeli and Palestinian flags from the grandstands, arguably a dubious case of play-it-safe moral equivalence, but, again, within its rights as a private organization.

But would not these indications of the West’s attitudes — freedom of questionable speech and then security precautions suggestive of fragility in the spine — be cues to reporters on the scene to consider the consequence of Hamas terrorism? It is not a matter of mixing sports and politics — never a very good idea — but simply of noting what’s going on at a sports event.

It may be of some interest that the Israel Tennis & Education Centers, maintained by one of the largest, if not the largest, social service agency in Israel, are working overtime to keep children busy with sports and classes in whatever subjects teachers are available during wartime. It is the kind of thing civilized nations do, with whatever means they have. They do not go searching for kids to kill, after turning their own kids into killers. ITCE is an organization created to help poor kids get a break. In a time of crisis, why should it not be news during one of the major tennis events on the calendar?

Israel is a civilized nation under the kind of assault that sooner or later will reach other civilized nations if they do not remain vigilant; this is simply a fact. The matches at the Australian Open will be terrific, and that is all to the good.

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