Matteo Berrettini‘s US Open campaign started on a bright note as he defeated Stan Wawrinka in the first round. He racked up a 7-6, 7-6, 6-0 victory, defeating Wawrinka in his final campaign at Flushing Meadows. While Berrettini was delighted with the victory, he addressed a very serious topic after the match. He exposed the dark side of betting in tennis today and shared a traumatic experience that he and his family had suffered earlier this year.

Turns out that Berrettini’s family was threatened by the bettors after his quarterfinal exit at the French Open against Matteo Arnaldi. He retired mid-match while trailing 7-5, 5-2 due to a hip injury. The Italian wants a committee to be formed so that players can be protected from such threats in the future.

“I just think we have to protect the players and do everything we can to create a safe environment for everyone,” he said at the post-match press conference, as reported by Ubitennis. “If I’m not mistaken, in Indian Wells, an Italian tennis player received messages, and here is my brother. At Roland Garros, he received messages on his phone with threats to my family and things like that. So I think we should create a stronger structure, I don’t know, a stronger committee to protect players.”

But Berrettini isn’t completely against betting. He believes that it can be carried out in a better way, where the level of the game isn’t brought down, and it doesn’t affect the players either.

“On the other hand, I think that if it’s done in the right way, if it’s managed in a controlled way, when I talk about betting, if it’s something that doesn’t lead to a degeneration of the game related to betting, then it can also be something fun. I personally have never done it in my life, and I don’t think I will start doing it,” he added.

This isn’t the first time that Berrettini has been a victim of online abuse or threats. Back in 2022, he opened up about seeing hateful messages on social media and was shocked by the way some people acted just because he lost a match.

“I’m on social media, but not a lot. I read, sometimes I smile, sometimes I feel bad,” he had said in an interview with Corriere dello Sport. “More than anything else, the wickedness surprises me. I wonder how one can vent so much on someone.”

The argument around betting in tennis has become even more serious now that tournaments have started to promote prediction market platforms. Notably, these platforms benefit from collecting insider information, which is an illegal practice. With match-fixing still being common at the lower levels of tennis, there are chances that bettors will constantly be lurking on these platforms. The US Open is the most recent tournament to promote such a platform

US Open’s reported partnership with Kalshi comes under criticism

According to a report by Front Office Sports, the US Open has struck a deal with Kalshi this season. It is a platform where individuals can trade directly on the outcomes of real-world events that will take place in the future.

This also means that the platform’s branding will appear across the US Open venues, and competitors like Polymarket will be prohibited from any type of advertising at the Grand Slam. The partnership has unexpectedly come under scrutiny, and one of its biggest critics is prominent tennis journalist Jon Wertheim, who believes that such partnerships can bring an increase in match-fixing scandals.

“This is *such* a disappointing decision, @usopen,” he wrote on X. “Not a week goes by when the tennis’ Integrity unit – that you help fund – fails to announce a match-fixing scandal…and you take sponsorship $ from a platform predicated on profiting from inside information? No way to spin this as a positive.”

Though Kalshi has employed strict monitoring safeguards to prevent outcome manipulation, there will always be a risk of bettors lurking and benefiting from the platform. It remains to be seen if more tournaments will partner with such platforms in the future.