If you’re a tennis fan, then you’ll no doubt be enjoying watching some of the greatest players in the game right now on the fabled grass courts at Wimbledon.

Among the likes of Emma Raducanu, Coco Gauff and Rafael Nadal, there’s the magnificent Venus Williams. A bona fide tennis legend with seven singles grand slams, 14 doubles grand slams, two mixed doubles grand slams and four Olympic gold medals under her belt, Venus has not only broken tennis records, but she’s redefined the sport as a Black woman and become a groundbreaking role model for women and people of colour.

Yes, it’s no exaggeration to say that Williams leaves an indelible mark upon every tournament she plays. So it’s all the more enraging, then, that the tennis star was shadily questioned about her motivations for taking part in Wimbledon this year.

Over the weekend, Williams and fellow tennis star Jamie Murray took part in a Wimbledon post-match press conference after winning their first-round match against Michael Venus and Alicja Rosolska in the mixed doubles competition on Saturday.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t the pair’s victory that got everyone talking, but a sexist question from a reporter who grilled Williams on her motivation for taking part in the tournament.

In a clip shared by BBC Sport, a reporter asks the duo the cliched, patronising question if they are “in it to win it”, or whether they’re simply in competition with Venus’s sister Serena Williams and Jamie’s brother Andy Murray, who were knocked out in the third round of their mixed doubles pairing during the 2019 Wimbledon tournament.

Williams then looks at Murray and says, bemusedly, “What kind of question is that?”

“We’re in it for a stroll,” she then responds sarcastically. “Come on.”

The reporter, however, persists with his demeaning line of questioning.

“Are you here for the experience or are you going to go all the way?” he continues.

Williams, who has won the ladies singles competition at Wimbledon five times, then delivers a stunning clapback.

“Are you going to write a good article or just a halfway decent one?” she fires back.

The internet went wild over Williams’ response, praising her words as a “smash hit” on Twitter.

It’s not the first time the Williams sisters have been on the receiving end of casually sexist remarks. Back in 2017, Andy Murray called out a reporter during a Wimbledon press conference following his quarter-final defeat to America’s Sam Querrey after it was suggested that Querrey was “the first US player to reach a major semi-final since 2009”.

Murray briskly responded: “Male player”, seemingly referring to the success of multiple US women since 2009, including the likes of Serena Williams, who won 12 grand slam titles during this period.

After Murray won Olympic gold for the second time in Rio de Janeiro, the tennis star also reminded John Inverdale that “Venus and Serena [Williams] have won about four each,” after the BBC host congratulated Murray on becoming “the first person ever to win two Olympic tennis gold medals.”

Image: Getty