Game, sex and match

Harvey Araton, a New York Times columnist, recently wrote that "the women have turned the Women's Tennis Association Tour into a circus of scandal, scoundrels and sex. Now THAT'S entertainment." Although Araton was being ironic, not necessarily praising the WTA product, it's true that stories about the women's circuit have become as bizarre as they are irresistible.

From the sublime to the ridiculous, the candid to the kinky, the hair-raising to the heart-rending, it all gets revealed, publicly discussed, broadcast in living colour around the world, and dissected at dozens of press conferences.

It's not just Steffi Graf's jailbird father, or Mary Pierce's father's lurid rap sheet, or Monica Seles' comeback after being stabbed on court, or Patty Schnyder's walk on the wild side with a middle-age man or Amelie Mauresmo's outing herself, or Martina Hingis doing a pitch-perfect imitation of McEnroe as Superbrat at this year's French Open. Even low-ranked qualifiers and new arrivals hit the circuit with creepy CVs, bodacious back-stories and an eerie ability to speak about it all in public.

The men's tour's idea of a rising star is Tim Henman, a fellow so full of rectitude it might be mistaken for rigor mortis.

In contrast, the women's notion of the next big thing is Alexandra Stevenson, the hard-hitting, statuesque love child of Doctor J (basketball star Julius Erving), who travels the circuit with her loquacious mom Samantha who, when not giving interviews about lockerroom lesbians, shoots off the odd freelance article profiling the hellish behavior of other players's parents.

By comparison, the men's tour is a sad, drab place full of bland boys in baggy drawers and shapeless shirts who look like refugees from a pyjama party for the personality challenged. The guys, especially the top dogs, just can't match the gals for pizzazz, panache and pure (or impure) sexiness. At least that's what conventional wisdom would have you believe.

But a moment's reflection suggests that there's more to this issue than mere coincidence - more, that is, than the unexplained disappearance of headline grabbers on the men's tour and their sudden reincarnation on the women's circuit. In part, the change is cultural and mirrors a healthy rising interest in women's sport worldwide. But there's also a large dollop of sexism and of journalistic double standards. The media applies a radically different lens to the WTA.

In fact, if left to its feeble devices, the WTA would like to imitate the men's antiseptic Born-to-Be-Mild image. But much as it has struggled to keep the lid on juicy stories and browbeat the press into compliance, it hasn't managed to impose a vow of omerta on the players or to persuade reporters to exercise the same restraint - read "self-censorship" - as the men's tour gets.

Anyone who doubts this has only to consider the case of Pete Sampras who, by his own repeated admission, is boring and prefers to remain that way. He admires the old Aussies, he says, guys who let their racquets and results do the talking, blokes who led simple, salt-of-the-earth lives and got on with the business of quietly winning Grand Slams.

Perhaps Pete is a true innocent or, like many contemporary players, has a shaky grasp of the game's history. But, for all their stiff-upper-lip, fair play images, many of the old Aussies were noisy, hard-drinking, hard-partying, skirt-chasing, corner-cutting, tax-dodging under-the-table money takers who, like most athletes of that era, travelled the circuit with a cadre of docile reporters who wrote for publications strictly interested in backhands and forehands and the annual article about strawberries and cream at Wimbledon.

Today, the situation is different. Publications actually demand a semblance of journalistic integrity on the sports page, and the public has developed a ravenous appetite for inside info, be it from the Oval Office or Centre Court. In Janusface fashion, tennis has responded by offering the public an opportunity to have it both ways. The guys get covered as if the game were still played in long white pants by cast members of Chariots of Fire, while the gals get the Spice Girl treatment, with reporters perpetually door-stepping them, shining lights in their faces and cameras up their skirts, asking questions about past indiscretions, present follies and future infractions.

Again, take Pete as an example. This spring at the French Open, the topic du jour was whether he could win on clay. Did he have the proper technique, enough preparation and patience? Behind the scenes, the pressroom buzzed with rumours that Sampras had just broken up with his girlfriend.

This might affect his performance. Women players are asked all the time about their personal relationships. They're pressed hard with follow-up questions. Not the men, not Pete.

Then, too, there's the fact that Sampras's former coach Pete Fischer copped a plea and went to jail for sexually abusing young boys. How upsetting was this to Sampras? Since he defended Fischer in the past, did Sampras feel let down by his mentor? Had he taken time to reflect on the matter and formulate advice for kids with private coaches? Had Fischer ever abused him? No one asked these questions. Sex - unless it's a smug joke: i.e. Agassi wisecracking, "I'm happier than a faggot in a submarine" - is always taboo on the men's tour. There are 1,000 names on the Association of Tennis Professionals' computer, and the sport has a rich legacy of gay male champions, but now its image is strictly macho gazpacho.

Reporters, all caring and sharing, respect the privacy of male players and never speculate about coach/player relationships. At least, they don't do so in print. They save that for private gossip about the gay European coach who ruined the chances of a Davis Cup team by favouring players who were assumed to be his lovers.

In contrast to the silence of the lambs on the men's circuit, it's open season with live ammunition on the women's tour, and the most intimate details of private lives are deemed appropriate for discussion. We -) I include myself in the noisy crowd - have little reluctance to ask about menstrual cycles, PMS, pregnancy, miscarriages, coach-player romances, marriages, divorces, and sexual orientation. These are legitimate journalistic issues, we claim. They affect who wins and who loses. They shape or curtail careers.

So we've got to ask the hard questions. But then why aren't men asked the same, or analogous, questions? Why is Anna Kournikova's relationship with hockey star Sergei Federov a hot topic that raises valid questions about teenagers and older men? Yet when Ivan Lendl, at the zenith of his career, travelled the tour with a schoolgirl whom he eventually married, it caused no comment.

When Chris Evert and John Lloyd divorced, every aspect of their relationship was examined under a microscope. Details about the division of property, right down to the last dime, were published, and Lloyd was excoriated in some quarters for the financial settlement he received.

But when Andre Agassi and Brooke Shields' marriage broke up, the press became the souls of reticence and discretion. Just the facts, only the bare bones were deemed fit to print. What ruined the relationship? In what sense were they ever really together? Had it actually been one of those made in Hollywood, career enhancing arrangements? How did they divide their assets? Was anyone else involved? Did it hurt Andre to see Brooke on the cover of various magazines in the company of a new man?

None of this came up during Agassi's post-match Q and As - except in the most insipid and vague references to "problems in his personal life." The reasoning ran that this was a painful topic and only a churl would pester the poor guy at a time like this and undermine his chances at Wimbledon.

But once away from the delicate buds on the men's tour, the fearless Woodwards and Bernsteins drop their kid gloves and ask hard-hitting questions that girls alone are expected to answer. Had Hingis apologised to Mauresmo for calling her "half a man" at the Australian Open? Did Mauresmo still want revenge? What lessons had Jennifer Capriati learned from her trials and tribulations five years ago? There may be a statute of limitation in criminal cases, but any malfeasance among the women remains fair game for comment for as long as any hack can remember.

On the men's circuit, meanwhile, amnesia rules. Whereas Steffi Graf's tax problems and fiscal misdemeanours attracted droves of investigative journalists to Germany and provoked a spate of cud-chewing coach/player relationships. At least, they don't do so in print. They save that for private gossip about the gay European coach who ruined the chances of a Davis Cup team by favouring players who were assumed to be his lovers.