Katie Boulter has revealed the extent to which she has been targeted by online abusers who have sent death threats, explicit pictures and toxic comments during her matches. The British No 2 believes much of the abuse comes from gamblers who have lost money.
Boulter, aiming for a hat-trick of victories at the Nottingham Open, opened her defence with a convincing 6-2, 6-2 win against the world No 44, Lulu Sun, but it was the grim catalogue of hate posted online that Boulter had earlier made public in an interview with BBC Sport which was the talk of the tournament.
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One message sent to the 28-year-old during the French Open, said: “Hope you get cancer”. Another told her: “Go to hell. I lost money my mother sent me.” While a third instructed her to buy “candles and a coffin for your entire family” and threatened to damage her “grandmother’s grave if she’s not dead by tomorrow”.
After her victory in Nottingham, Boulter said she realised people simply did not know the extent to which tennis players were being abused. “I looked on my phone this morning and there were hundreds of messages of people reacting to it [the interview],” she said.
“Every single person was telling me to disregard it and how much they loved me and how much they appreciated me bringing this subject to light. I don’t think people were aware of it. I don’t think people were aware how much it happens to players.
“A lot of comments are very emotional responses. I wouldn’t say they are normal responses. They always seem to be during a match and a lot of them do reference gambling, saying you lost them a lot of money. We’re still all learning, but a lot of it’s from that.
“I’m past the point of worrying what people actually say to me, it’s more about somehow finding a way to stop that from happening. My goal was to raise awareness. There’s a lot of it. It’s pretty hard to contain it.”
Tennis authorities have been using an AI-led detection system called Threat Matrix since last year to try to prevent the worst of the abuse reaching the players.
The WTA’s and ITF’s first report on the subject, which was published on Tuesday, outlined the scale of the problem, revealing 458 players were shown to have been subjected to direct abuse or threat. Signify Group, which runs the system, established that 40% of overall open-source social media abuse came from frustrated gamblers – a figure which rose to 77% for direct abuse towards players’ personal accounts.
Boulter’s fiance, Alex de Minaur, praised her for highlighting the issue. “It’s good to kind of shine a light on everything that happens not only when you lose,” he said after his 6-4, 6-2 defeat against the Czech player Jiri Lehecka at Queen’s Club.
“You’re feeling not in the best state emotionally [when you lose], but then you’ve also got to deal with everything that happens behind the scenes with angry gamblers. I haven’t gone on my social media yet, but I’m sure I’ll have a lot of people not too happy with my result today.”
The WTA players’ council member Jessica Pegula called for the gambling industry and social media companies to take action. “Online abuse is unacceptable and something that no player should have to endure,” she said. “It’s time for the gambling industry and social media companies to tackle the problem at its source and act to protect everyone facing these threats.”
Boulter’s next opponent in Nottingham, fellow Briton Sonay Kartal – who defeated the French qualifier Leolia Jeanjean 6-3, 6-4 – is another who has been on the receiving end. “Win or lose, that’s the stuff I get on my DMs or my Instagram,” she said. “It’s obviously not nice. If there’s anything I think is dangerous I’ll report it. It’s tough. I think it’s all sports. It is scary at times.”
Fifteen cases have been passed on to law enforcement authorities for assessment and possible action since Threat Matrix was introduced.
Harriet Dart, who lost against fellow Briton Fran Jones in straight sets, said abuse is simply part and parcel of life as a tennis player. “What’s quite scary is that we think this is normal. The amount of abuse we all get is pretty mind-blowing,” she said. “Some of them have full profiles and they’ve got a wife and kids – you just think this person’s nuts. They’d never say it to your face.
“But clearly when they’re threatening your family it can be quite serious and you just report it. It’s a scary world we live in.”
Dart called for social media companies to bring in mandatory identification for account holders. “We live in the 21st century. How we’re not ID’ing people on social media, and then they can be found … it’s pretty horrific.”
