Top players often enjoy the privilege of being the most loved players on the tour. They have huge fan bases behind them, who follow them in every way possible. Unfortunately, this attention and adulation in the age of social media also comes with a cost. Along with being the most loved, these players like Naomi Osaka, Serena Williams, and Emma Raducanu are also often the most abused ones. 

A recent study conducted by Pickswise revealed a list of the top 20 players who received abusive tweets in the past 12 months (January – December 2021). Pickswise collected the data directly from Twitter and analyzed over 100,000 tweets to give out the results. 

The top 10 most abused players saw 6 ATP players along with 4 WTA players.

Naomi Osaka, Serena Williams, Roger Federer, and Novak Djokovic all feature in unfortunate list

As per the study, the most abused player of 2021 is the Japanese former World No.1 Naomi Osaka. Osaka, who was in the spotlight because of her firm stance about protecting her mental health, received 32,415 abusive tweets last year.

She was followed by the American legend, Serena Williams. Williams received a total of 18,118 abusive tweets in 2021 despite being absent for large parts of the season.

The third most abused player on Twitter was 3-time Grand Slam champion, Andy Murray. The British player received 11,732 abusive tweets last year. Next in line is the 19-year-old 2021 US Open champion Emma Raducanu with 10,094 tweets. Raducanu only burst onto the scene at Wimbledon last year, and then lived a fairytale during the US Open. 

Novak Djokovic holds the fifth position in the list of most abused tennis athletes with 8,439 hate tweets. However, what comes as a shock is that the Serb received an additional 7,354 abusive tweets between January 4 – January 10. This was the time when Djokovic faced visa issues in Australia due to his stance on vaccination. 

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Following Djokovic were other big names like Roger Federer (4,261 tweets), Stefanos Tsitsipas (4,084 tweets), Rafael Nadal (3,588 tweets), Alexander Zverev (3,454 tweets), and Simona Halep (3,181 tweets). 

The study is an unfortunate reminder about the kind of language and treatment that top stars are subjected to on social media.

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