Regular readers of this newsletter would be familiar with the fact we are quite fond of villains. Maybe this is because we live in the age of the anti-hero. Tony Soprano. Cersei Lannister. Logan Roy. The villain is a richer source material.
Which made week one of the Australian Open enjoyable on several fronts.
At time of writing, the headline act in villainy has been Danielle Collins. It was always going to be hard for the 31-year-old American to win over the crowd as she went against local feel-great story Destanee Aiava in the second round.
With her emotive backstory, elite vintage dresses and big game, Aiava is easy to love. When she spoke about her round one prize money changing her life, there was a sense of a tennis Cinderella. Instead of a glass slipper, Aiava was sporting an old Maria Sharapova dress.
So, when Collins knocked her out and proceeded to blow mock kisses to the crowd while motioning for them to kiss her arse, the boos rung out. The American leaned into the conflict, goading the crowd in the on-court interview and doubling down afterward.
"One of the greatest things about being a professional athlete is the people that don't like you and the people that hate you — they actually pay your bills. It's kind of a cool concept."
She promised to send us some content from her next five-star holiday. The old fashioned spite post.
"Obviously, my professional career is not going to last forever, so I just remind myself every day when I have that kind of stuff, they're paying my bills … it's all going towards the Danielle Collins fund."
Collins was probably overstating her own villainy, the show court crowd would've probably turned on Zoë Foster Blake if she was getting in Aiava's way. Yet, Collins re-imagining herself as a financial battler was jarring. A woman with $9m USD in career earnings framing her career as a kind of Go Fund Me was a stretch.
The whole thing had the energy of a future Karen arriving too soon.
The American was not the only seed to get the masses offside. Iga Swiatek committed a rare unforced error as she told Jelena Dokic that Sydney's coffee was superior to the brews served in Melbourne.
The gasps from the Rod Laver faithful were audible. Pearls were clutched in anxiety as Swiatek attempted to dig her way out of the hole. Not since Rebecca Judd decried Melbourne as 'woke, broke and violent' have we witnessed such Victorian hand-wringing.
Wearing the metaphorical black hat in the men's draw was Daniil Medvedev. In round one he destroyed a racquet smashing the net, but noted that the camera embedded in said net had withstood his barrage. Consequently, he argued, the fine should be well under the maximum $80k.
"Well honestly, I hope not too big because probably the fine is usually for breaking the racket. And the camera is going to cost some but I don't think a GoPro is that expensive."
"But what I have to say is that the camera was very, very strong because my racket didn't handle the damage but the camera did. It broke down but there was not one piece going out from the camera."
The Russian lasted only slightly longer than the busted racquet, losing in the next match and skipping the press conference as the fines mounted.
Amid these candidates for villainy, is the diminutive white knight. Alex de Minaur. The softly spoken good guy of Australian tennis has his first real test when he plays Francisco Cerundolo in the third round. Hear it all, live and ad free on the ABC listen app.
