Alycia Parks is a really fascinating tennis player who created a lot of buzz this year for both good and bad reasons.
The most recent buzz-worthy thing was a rather negative one, though it happens rather frequently in tennis. During a doubles match at the 2023 Korea Open between Parks and Sofia Kenin, and Luksika Kumkhum and Peangtarn Plipuech, the American hit a smash into her opponent, who was literally trying to hide from it.
It's not something uncommon in tennis because it does tend to happen often despite the court being rather large. When players go up for a smash, they can't really see the court because their eyes are on the ball, and depending on the position of their opponent this does tend to happen.
We saw earlier this year how Cameron Norrie hit Novak Djokovic with an overhead smash, and the Serbian wasn't too happy with that. It just happens, and it happened in this match as well, but it was controversial as Parks smashed it pretty hard, and it hit her opponent.
She obviously apologized but the match had to stop for a while to allow the Thai player to compose herself. It happened in the second set of the match with the Thai combination ending up as winners in the end.
Controversies are not foreign to Parks, who has had a few in her career. She's a pretty fiery player, generally with a lot of passion, and doesn't mind playing the villain, though she doesn't do it on purpose, of course.
We'll see whether she develops a reputation, but for now, she's still known as one of the best young players, though not very polished.
She needs to polish her tennis as she's very raw, but the tools are there for her to be great. An 18-25 record is respectable but could have been a lot better.
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