SERENA WILLIAMS and Naomi Osaka are the most trolled tennis players on the tennis circuit according to research. With online abuse still a huge issue in the sporting world, Pickswise decided to analyse every tweet sent to professional tennis players in order to showcase what these athletes are subjected to when opening their apps. 

Japanese star Osaka was the most abused tennis player on Twitter in 2021, receiving 32,415 mentions that had a negative sentiment. The 24-year-old took multiple hiatuses from the sport last year, citing mental health issues and faced criticism after declining to attend a selection of press conferences. 

2021 US Open Champion Emma Raducanu faced plenty of negative attention after her retirement at Wimbledon last summer and the teenager had the fourth most abusive tweets directed at her last year (10,094). 

Tennis icon Williams missed a lot of the tour in 2021 due to injury, however that did not stop trolls from targeting her Twitter account. The younger Williams sister was targeted with 18,118 toxic tweets, finishing second only to Osaka.

Novak Djokovic’s actions during the pandemic have caused a stir in the tennis and wider sporting communities, and “Nole” received over eight thousand abusive tweets in 2021. 

However, with Djokovic and his family battling with Australian authorities over visa and vaccination issues, the 20-time major winner was subject to an increased amount of hate. From January 4- January 10 this year, Djokovic received 7,354 abusive tweets, nearly matching his 2021 total in just one week. 

Other “Big 3” members Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal were also subject to some social media hate. Federer amassed over 4,200 negative tweets whereas the Spaniard received just over 3,500 abusive tweets. 

British tennis legend Sir Andy Murray is usually very active on his social accounts, tweeting about a variety of different topics, and the Scot was subject to the most Twitter hate of any male player in the top 10 (11,732 in total). 

To see the full data, please visit: https://www.pickswise.com/tennis/most-abused-tennis-players/