'Invest In Women's Sports': Serena Williams' Husband Ohanian Reacts To US Open Viewership
ATP & WTA
Alexis Ohanian, the husband to 23-time Grand Slam champion Serena Williams, urged responsible stakeholders to invest in tennis in the wake of massive viewership of the 2023 US Open women's final.
19-year-old Coco Gauff squared off against new WTA No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka last Saturday, a match that garnered an impressive 3.42 million viewers in the United States, trumping the men's final by a considerable margin of more than a million in viewership. Gauff won a maiden major title at the end of the night.
By contrast, 2.32 million tuned in to see Novak Djokovic beat Daniil Medvedev to win a record-tyring 24th Grand Slam title 24 hours later. Ohanian pointed out the substantial difference in TV numbers and made his intentions clear in a series of posts on X (formerly known as Twitter).
One user tried to disregard the message saying that an American's presence in the women's final swung those numbers in their favor. Ostensibly, Ohanian responded by saying that the US Open women's final has 'always' had better numbers than the men's annually.
Ohanian is an advocate of women's sports being a majority shareholder of American soccer team Angel City, and used his platform to raise awareness of male-dominated sports.
In a series of tweets, the Reddit co-founder tried to back up his claims by comparing how the Gauff-Sabalenka final rivals Wimbledon men's final numbers in 2019 (3.83 million) and 2023 (3.2 million) in terms of American viewers.
"Facts > Feelings. US viewership of @USOpen finals: Coco Gauff vs Aryna Sabalenka: 3.422 million. Novak Djokovic vs Daniil Medvedev: 2.321 million. The free market speaks (again). Invest in Women's Sports. @weareangelcity was just the start for me..."
"Spoiler: the US viewership for the women trump the men in the USOpen final Every. Single. Year."
"Cope harder, folks. The Wimbledon MEN'S FINAL set records with 3.2M viewers -- trailing only Djokovic-Roger Federer in 2019 (3.83M) as the most-watched Wimbledon singles final in more than a decade. And this US Open Women's Final was still watched by more Americans."
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