Serena williams

It happened on a Russian television
show.
"I was at the Olympics and saw Maria
Sharapova play her … him …," said Ivan
Urgant, the host of an aptly named
nighttime interview show, Evening
Urgant.
"… One of the Williams brothers," Shamil
Tarpischev finished .
This would just be ugly if run-of-the-mill
sexism were it not for the fact that
Tarpischev is head of Russia's Tennis
Federation and the director of an annual
professional tournament in Moscow.
Now, he faces a one-year ban and a
$25,000 fine from the Women's Tennis
Association (WTA) for his comments.
"I am sorry that the joke which was
translated into English out of its context
of a comedy show drew so much
attention," he has said since in a
statement. "I don’t think this situation is
worth all the hoopla because those words
were said without any malice." He later
added the event "was hyped to an absurd
level."
Serena Williams will kick off defending
her WTA Tour Finals championship in
Singapore this week. The WTA's swift
action seems to have kept the comments
from becoming a distraction.