Tennis has always had villains. Players who routinely break the rules are nothing new to tennis. But Hungarian player Amarissa Toth has become tennis’ most hated player. In the first round of the Budapest Grand Prix, Toth erased the ball mark on the court which caused her opponent Zhang Shuai to panic attack and forced her to retire from the match.
To make things worse, Toth celebrated her win after Shuai’s retirement. Zhang Shuai is one of the well-liked players on tour. WTA players rallied behind Shuai and tennis fans on social media torched Toth for her behavior.
Since the incident, Amarissa Toth has been on an apology tour. After the match, she said:
I do realize I shouldn’t have celebrated the way I celebrated after the match and I’m sorry for that. I was acting in the heat of the match and got caught up by my emotions and the moment. I focused on tennis, I didn’t want to win like that.
Toth is ranked outside the top 500 in rankings. She is an up-and-coming player who plays mostly on the ITF tour due to her low rankings.