The career of Russian tennis player Yevgeny Kafelnikov has developed successfully: the gold of the 2000 Olympics, six victories in Grand Slam tournaments and the status of the first racket of the world are proof of this. However, in addition to triumphs, there were also scandals.

One day, Eugene had a tough fight with the organizers of the US Open.

Not the fourth, but the seventh

In 1996, Kafelnikov gave a productive season. He approached the next Grand Slam tournament fully armed, winning 57 matches and winning at Roland Garros in both singles and doubles. Only a rib injury interfered a little, but Evgeny healed it intensively. It seemed that no problems were expected in New York for the fourth racket of the world.

Photo: © Franck Seguin / Contributor / Corbis Sport / Gettyimages.com

However, even before the start of the competition, something incomprehensible began to happen. The organizers of the US Open decided to change the principle of the draw. Instead of the classic ATP rankings, they took as a basis … the popularity of the players and their hypothetical chances of winning on hard. This system was advocated by the President of the US Tennis Association Les Snyder.

According to the new provision, Kafelnikov received not the fourth seeding number, as was originally supposed, but the seventh. Preference was given to the Americans: almost all the hosts increased their chances of winning. The main result of the draw was the breeding of Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi, two top tennis players of the mid-nineties, on opposite sides of the net.

After being rebuffed by the players and their agents, the organizers shuffled the grid, but no one got better from it. Kafelnikov still remained outside the top 4 and risked stumbling upon the most powerful Sampras long before the final.

Photo: © RIA Novosti / Alexei Filippov

Boycott dishonesty

Of course, this alignment did not suit the Russian. Kafelnikov issued an angry tirade in the media, in which he accused the organizers of a biased attitude towards himself.

“I was completely shocked when I heard what they did. I won a Grand Slam this year and I’m pretty good on the hard court. It is unlikely that these people would have acted in the same way with someone like Boris Becker, Kafelnikov was indignant, whose words are quoted in an archived publication of The New York Times.

It is worth noting that Becker did not participate in the 1996 US Open due to injury.

Les Snyder tried to justify himself: they say that Kafelnikov has health problems, and no one knew that he would eventually participate. However, Evgeny replied that the injury did not interfere with the game, and his interest in the tournament was genuine: if he won, he would have risen to the top three of the strongest tennis players on the planet. But this did not happen: an angry Russian boycotted the Americans.

“I’m flying home because I don’t want to participate in a tournament where these things happen. I think too much about it and I’m very upset, so I’m leaving,” Kafelnikov said and left the championship before it began.

The end of “miracles”

ATP unexpectedly took the side of Evgeny. Its chairman, Mike Miles, said bluntly that the organizers had acted unfairly towards the Russian. The head of the ATP Players Council, Todd Martin, went even further and said that the change in seeding principles leaves a stain on the reputation of the tournament. Kafelnikov was even left with points in the rankings scored in New York a year earlier – this has never happened before.

The organizers of the US Open tried to return the Russian, but he remained unconvinced. As a result, the Grand Slam tournament was held without the fourth racket of the world. It was expectedly won by Sampras – however, in the final, he was opposed not by Agassi, but by the second number in the rating, Michael Chang.

Despite the boycott, at the end of the season, Kafelnikov still ended up in the top three players on the planet. But most importantly, the “miracles” with a strange seeding at the US Open have stopped. So the scandal, in a sense, even played for the benefit of world tennis.