Tennis Pro Emma Raducanu Complained About A Crying But The Umpire Wouldn’t Have It

As parents, we hear a lot about where we should and shouldn’t be bringing our children. Airplanes. Movies. Breweries. Restaurants. There seems to be a subset of the population who believes children should be kept in isolated caves in the middle of the woods until they’re old enough to rent a car, at which point they should be a fully-functioning, well-adjusted member of society.

But now the “should that baby be here” discourse has offered a new scenario to debate: tennis matches.

On Monday, champions Aryna Sablenka and Emma Raducanu faced off in a lengthy match at the Cincinnati Open. During Raducanu’s serve at one point, a small child could be heard kicking up a fuss in the stands. Raducanu, visibly annoyed, took a moment to walk up to the umpire.

“It's been like 10 minutes,” she can be heard saying.

“It's a child,” the umpire replied. “Do you want me to send the child out of the stadium?” Her tone was one that implied this was an unreasonable course of action.

“Yes!” some members of the audience responded. Raducanu gestured to those who answered as if to say “See? They want you to chuck the baby out, too!”

“I can call in, but we need to continue for the moment,” the umpire conceded.

Gameplay continued and Raducanu won the point, though she ultimately lost to Sabalenka.

As with anything child-related on Blue Ivy’s internet, the incident sparked debate, though most commenters across social media seem to take Raducanu’s stance that the child (and, presumably, their parents) should be ejected from the stadium.

“Under 6 at a tennis match? No thanks,” wrote one YouTube user. “There’s a reason playgrounds exist.”

“Far too many people think that having a child means you are exempt from rules or that you deserve some extra level of sympathy or special treatment. You don’t. Simple,” rules another. “If your child can’t keep quiet, stay home.”

“The child shouldn't be there in the first place, now empire [sic... pretty sure they mean “umpire”] Karen is acting like Emma is a vile person,” scoffs a third.

I don’t think this is fair, strictly speaking. Yes, the parents should have taken the child out of the seating area until they could settle down and quiet down. But that doesn’t mean they can’t bring a child at all. I’m sure there are children at most professional tennis matches and no one, least of all the players, really notice.

But I have an honest question in all this: who decided tennis has to be silent?

I mean, really, aside from golf, tennis, and bowling are there even moderately popular sports that require near silence from the audience? And zero shade to Raducanu — regardless of the why, the game is played in silence, that is the standard expectation and it should be respected. But in a world where Simone Biles is consistently landing double backflips with three twists in front of roaring crowds, I find it hard to believe that silence is required for peak athletic performance. Like “These are the world’s most powerful tennis players... Now everyone shhhhhhhhhhhh! Be vewy quiet so they can concentwate. They can’t play if you make noise.” It just feels a little precious.

To quote one YouTube commenter: “Imagine a basket player calling to shut up every time they throw a free shot.”

But, as I said: that is currently how it works. As such, we’re not saying don’t bring your kids with you, but do be mindful that standard kid noises probably aren’t going to go over very well.