Revisiting the ruthless coverage of Azarenka's 2013 Aussie Open run
"It took me 10 f***king years to get over it."
Ten years after she won her second straight Australian Open title in 2013, Victoria Azarenka finally made it back into the semifinals in Melbourne last week, where she lost 7-6(7), 6-3 to reigning Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina.
Despite the loss, her deep run offered the public a chance to become reacquainted with the former No. 1, who is now a 33-year-old mother. And while she still has the eccentric, brash edge that defined her rise to the top of the game in her late teens and early 20s, she’s also worked hard to evolve and grow, on and off the court. (In other words, like a true millennial , it seems she’s spent some time over the past few years in therapy.)
That growth was on full display as she played match after match on Rod Laver Arena — which despite being the site of her greatest career triumphs, is also rife with reminders of one of the most traumatic incidents in her tennis career.
The most ridiculed panic attack of all time
It was the 2013 Australian Open. Azarenka was No. 1 in the world and the defending champion. She was slated to meet Serena Williams in the semifinals. But 19-year-old Sloane Stephens had other plans; in the quarterfinals, Stephens beat Williams (who, it must be said, was struggling with an ankle injury) and became an overnight media sensation.
In the semifinal, Stephens looked outmatched and Azarenka got out to a 6-1, 5-3 lead. That’s when things took a turn.1 Azarenka squandered (or Stephens saved, depending on your perspective) five match points while serving for the match. Then, before Stephens had a chance to serve to even the second set at 5-5, the Belarusian called the trainer. She seemed to be having trouble breathing. The trainer started to adjust back on the side of the court, then they went off court. In total it was a nine-minute medical timeout. When Azarenka returned to the court, she broke Stephens to win 6-1, 6-4, and advance to the final.
People were, understandably, curious as to what caused Azarenka to take such a long timeout at such an important part of the match for her opponent. And her answers were initially clunky. In the post-match interview, she didn’t discuss any physical injury, but rather talked about how she almost choked the match away, was overwhelmed, and nervous. In an interview with Belarusian media, she said she had a panic attack. But the narrative that she was a cheater who was manipulating the rules to ice Stephens before a crucial service game emerged before she even reached the post-match press conference, which was essentially a criminal interrogation.
Never mind that anyone watching the match saw Azarenka clearly was having trouble breathing. Never mind that the tournament director confirmed she was treated for a back injury and didn’t break any rules. Never mind that Azarenka repeatedly said she had a blocked rib that was causing her breathing issues, which would naturally be exacerbated by an extremely long, physical game and nerves. Never mind that anyone who has ever had a panic attack knows that it does, in fact, manifest itself physically. She was the villain.
When Azarenka took the court for the final less than two days later, she was booed. And even though she went on to defeat the beloved Li Na 4–6, 6–4, 6–3 to win the championship two days later (a surreal match in itself2), the furor over her medical timeout against Stephens clouded everything, and the gamesmanship narrative followed her for years.
“It was one of the worst things that I've ever gone through in my professional career, the way I was treated after that moment, the way I had to explain myself until 10:30 p.m. at night because people didn't want to believe me,” she told reporters in Melbourne last week.
“It took me 10 fucking years to get over it.”
Here’s a taste of how cruel the coverage was
After hearing Azarenka talk about 2013, I had to go back to the archives and see if the coverage was as bad as I remembered; and it turns out, it was! (Although I’m pretty sure the television commentary was even worse.)
Here are a couple of articles published after the semifinal:
What makes me the most angry about that article? Well, the headline made me punch a wall, and I created a second hold reading Chris McKendry’s line about how Azarenka “injured her nerves.”
The above article is the AP write-up that appeared in newspapers across the world, setting the parameters for much of the conversation to follow. The headline on this particular version isn’t the worst I saw, but here are a smattering of headlines3 from other publications after the match:

The final headline in the above screenshot, “A Timeout Jeered Round the World,” is from the New York Times. The accompanying article, written by Christopher Clarey and Lynn Zinser, includes a section that really sums up why the reaction was so problematic:
If Azarenka was not legitimately injured, was calling a medical timeout cheating? Playing at the edge of the rules? Good old win-at-any-cost strategy?
To Michael F. Bergeron, executive director of the National Youth Sports Health & Safety Institute, it is part of a disturbing trend extending to youth sports: emphasizing winning over sportsmanship and developing character.
“I’m not saying everyone does that, and I’d like to think there are still players who would never do it,” Bergeron said. “It shows a lack of character, a lack of respect for her opponent and the game. You’d like to think sports would be developing those traits. But in the bigger picture, this emphasis on winning and losing over everything else is doing athletes a disservice. It’s not making them better people. It’s not making them better athletes.”
This wasn’t a debate about the tennis rulebook; it was a referendum on Azarenka’s character and being. She was, in essence, being called a callous cheater for having a panic attack. She was villainized for getting treatment for the physical symptoms she was receiving, and ridiculed for being able to gather herself enough to win one of the biggest tennis matches in her career, all within nine minutes.
I am in awe of how candidly Azarenka discusses her anxiety today
I like to think the media and the public-at-large are better at talking about mental health issues than we were a decade ago. Azarenka certainly is.
She was driving the conversation during this Australian Open. After her quarterfinal win over No. 3 Jessica Pegula, Casey Dellacqua asked Azarenka in her on-court interview to talk about the work she put in during the offseason. Instead of talking about any improvements to her forehand or serve, Azarenka talked about her mind.
“Last year, my tennis wasn’t bad, but I felt I wasn’t really mentally there to go out there. I played with a lot of fear, with a lot of anxiety, and it really was difficult to be brave and to make the right choices in the important moment when you feel anxious, when you feel hesitant. I worked a lot on my mindset,” she said.
Later, in her press conference, the great Tumaini Carayol from The Guardian asked Azarenka, “You said on the court last year you played with a bit of anxiety at times. How did you tackle that and recognize it and try to move on from it?”
Her entire answer is worth reading, emphasis mine:
VICTORIA AZARENKA: Well, I don't think you recognize it right away. I think it builds up until you hit kind of a pretty bad spot where nothing kind of makes sense. You feel kind of lost. I was at the point where I couldn't find anything that I feel good about myself, not like even one sentence. I broke a few racquets after my match in Ostrava (smiling). That was kind of a very tough moment for me.
From then, I kind of tried to take it more simple. I started with not trying to be positive, just trying to be neutral, not to go negative. Accepting the anxiety that I have. Accepting the fear that I have. Kind of working through it. That was step by step.
I kept trying to go a little step forward, another challenge, another step forward. I learned how to kind of start to build a process that is step by step instead of kind of jumping to conclusion in the situation, jumping to a result, or to the goal, and really focused on step by step, which is pretty hard to do. I think it requires a lot of work, daily work, that I'm doing.
But, yeah, I'm pretty happy that the process that I'm going through makes me feel confident about myself, happy about myself, and helps me to be more open, be more accepting, be compassionate. 'Compassionate' was a very hard word for me to understand.
Later in the press conference, Catherine Whitaker, one of the hosts of The Tennis Podcast, asked Azarenka to elaborate on the fears she was experiencing. I think anyone who has battled anxiety will appreciate her answer.
VICTORIA AZARENKA: Fears of failing is a big one. To not be able to do what I want to do. So subconsciously sometimes it stops you from doing it.
I think the point of being uncomfortable is scary. I've had panic attacks before. For me to recognize the difference was a hard one.
Finally, it was David Law — another host of The Tennis Podcast, which you should all definitely listen to — who asked Azarenka specifically about what happened here a decade ago. I’ll include that full exchange below.
DAVID LAW: Thinking back to I think it was your match against Sloane Stephens 10 years ago now, you leaving the court. Now that you've gone through this process in the last six months, year, do you now understand what happened back then a little bit more? I wonder what you might have said to yourself back then.
VICTORIA AZARENKA: Do you know what happened 10 years ago? That's the thing.
It was one of the worst things that I've ever gone through in my professional career, the way I was treated after that moment, the way I had to explain myself until 10:30 p.m. at night because people didn't want to believe me. I actually can resonate what Novak said the other day.
There is sometimes, like, I don't know, incredible desire for a villain and a hero story that has to be written. But we're not villains, we're not heroes, we are regular human beings that go through so many, many things.
Assumptions and judgments, all those comments, are just shit because nobody's there to see the full story. It didn't matter how many times I said my story, it did not cut through.
Actually it's funny that you're saying that because I was thinking about it. It took me 10 (expletive) years to get over it. I finally am over that.
Phew. I’m trying to think of a really insightful way to wrap this all up, but I’m not sure I can top what Azarenka said herself. We all need to do less searching for heroes and villains, and instead strive for compassion, with ourselves and others.
Also? Bring your kid in sunglasses to pressers, if that option is available to you.


So, as many of you know, tennis used to be my main sport, as a fan and a writer. And back in 2013, I co-authored a tennis blog, The Changeover, with two other tennis writers. We covered the sport exhaustively, even writing “live analysis” of important matches, which used to be a much more popular Internet Thing than it is now. While I had completely forgotten this, I apparently was the one who woke up at 3:30 a.m. to live-blog the Azarenka/Stephens semifinal. So you can quite literally read my thoughts about this match IN REAL TIME. What a world! I was, like everyone else, very confused.
Yes, apparently I live-blogged the final too. I must admit: I have some good lines in there. It holds up.
"No. I Azarenka’s ‘injury’ break helps her finish off Stephens, 19” (The Indianapolis Star)
“Victoria Azarenka’s Crying Shame” (The Independent)
“Azarenka injects drama into her win” (Tampa Bay Times)
“Azarenka alters story as time-out row boils over” (The Daily Telegraph)
“Victoria Azarenka: How to Cheat Your Way to the 2013 Australian Open Final” (Bleacher Report)
“A Timeout Jeered Round the World” (New York Times)