Japan Celebrates Bi-Racial Heroine Naomi Osaka for her US Open Feat
Naomi Osaka is hogging the headlines for all the right reasons in her native land after she became the first Japanese player to reach a Grand Slam singles final. She’s also helping break new ground in Japan due to her multiracial identity: the daughter of a Haitian father and Japanese mother.
Naomi Osaka became the first Japanese woman to win a Grand Slam title on Saturday as her idol Serena Williams angrily imploded, calling the chair umpire in the US Open final “a thief”.
Osaka, 20, triumphed 6-2, 6-4 in the match marred by Williams’s second set outburst, the American enraged by umpire Carlos Ramos’s warning for receiving coaching from her box.
She tearfully accused him of being a “thief” and angrily demanded an apology from the official.
When a second code violation for racquet abuse was handed out to her – along with a point penalty – Williams exploded.
“You’re attacking my character,” she said. “You will never, ever be on another court of mine. You are the liar,” she fumed and Ramos handed her a game penalty that put Osaka one game from victory at 5-3 in the second set.
Williams won the next game, and continued her tearful remonstrations with a supervisor on the change-over but Osaka – who displayed remarkable poise throughout – held serve to seal a historic win for her.
