Yulia Putintseva has hit back at Maria Sakkari after their feisty exchange at the Bad Homburg Open in Germany went viral.
Sakkari beat Putintseva 7-5 7-6 (8-6) in a close encounter before the pair shook hands and exchanged insults.
One of the comments made by Sakkari to Putintseva which the microphone picked up was “when you shake hands with someone, look them in the eyes” followed by “nobody likes you”.
In her on court-interview, former world No 3 Sakkari said: “I don’t think she’s going to invite me for dinner for the rest of our lives, but I don’t care.
“I have very good friends and I’ll go to dinner with them. Let me leave it here, and just say that I have respect for her as a player, but that’s it.”
On Monday, Putintseva posted on her Instagram story “by the way – not that I care – I shook her hand as most women do. Clearly not according to the ‘hugging protocol’ some men seem to follow.”
Putintseva also reposted a video from Instagram account The Tennis Pulse which showed a clip of Sunday’s incident where Sakkari said “when you shake hands, look at the other person in the eye”, before switching to the Greek place shaking hands with Emma Raducanu and Martina Trevisan in different matches. In both instances, Sakkari’s head was not looking at her opponent in the pictures.
In the same video, Putintseva posted a caption of “And the plot thickens…” with a clown emoji.
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Last year, Putintseva apologised after an awkward exchange with a ball girl during her third-round US Open exit.
A video circulated which showed a ball girl tossing two balls to Putintseva, who stared back at her without moving as the balls bounced away and along the ground.
The 30-year-old lost 6-3 6-4 to Italy’s Jasmine Paolini and blamed two missed break points in the sixth game of the second as the cause of her misplaced frustration.
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