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Tennis

Opposing Fans Brawl on Grounds of Australian Open

Posted Jan 21, 2009 4:06PM By Shane Bacon (RSS feed)

Filed Under: Police Blotter, Australian Open, WTA

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The tennis might have been pretty at the Australian Open Tuesday, but the action after play was over turned pretty ugly.



Croatian Marin Cilic defeated Serbian Janko Tipsarevic in four sets during round two, but the bigger story came when fans from both sides got so violent towards each other that cops had to be brought into Court Two and the brawl ended up spilling out into the Garden Square.
The two groups faced off, hurling chants and shouting abuse. The situation only was defused when police, who had been discreetly positioned around the arena, moved them on.

Punches later were thrown in a scuffle near a packed bar. Both groups, wearing national colors, then continued to march around Melbourne Park in large packs. A repeat of the out-of-control brawl in 2007 did not eventuate.
As scary as this one was, one player is worried it could get worse. Bosnian-born player Amer Delic is facing off against third-ranked Novak Djokovic and is pleading with his fans to just be chill and not bring all the political tension to the tennis arena.
"I'm just hoping in the next match with Novak that it doesn't turn in to World War III," he said. "I am going to try and tell my fans that we don't need to be embarrassing ourselves in the eyes of the world."
Sometimes, as an American, I forget how intense things can get when these nations meet in anything, be it tennis or cricket or just hanging out at a bar. While Steelers fans might hate the Ravens, it isn't like they're marching around with political chips on their shoulders, actually hating the people that support a squad from Baltimore.

This stuff appears to be too serious for the sports world, and we can only hope that they avoid making it bigger than the game itself.

Tags: Amer+Delic, AmerDelic, Janko+Tipsarevic, JankoTipsarevic, Marin+Cilic, MarinCilic, novak+djokovic, NovakDjokovic

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Greg Couch

Greg CouchGreg Couch is a national columnist and award-winning tennis writer for FanHouse.com. A former ranked amateur tennis player, who dabbled in a few pro tournaments, he came to FanHouse after 12 years at the Chicago Sun-Times. "The best tennis writer in America," according to Jason Whitlock, national columnist and guest host of the Jim Rome radio show.

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