When commentator Ian Cohen asked Canadian Eugenie Bouchard to “twirl” for the audience after her Australian Open tennis match last night, we bet he wasn’t expecting this kind of reaction.
The 20-year-old wrapped up her 6-0 6-3 victory over Netherlands’ Kiki Bertens, only to be greeted by the on-court interviewer who, for some reason or another, wanted to talk fashion. “Last night you tweeted that you love Serena’s outfit,” he said. “Obviously the fluro’s working for you girls at the moment.”
Then he used the neon-centric conversation to get a few moves out the seventh-seed star, who was wearing a pink spaghetti-strap singlet and skirt, teamed with neon-yellow trainers, a sports bra and visor all by Nike. “She was kind enough to give us a twirl,” he said of Serena. “Can you give us a twirl and tell us about your outfit?”
Eugenie looked a little surprised. “A twirl?” She asked. “A Twirl, a pirouette, here we go,” he encouraged. The crowd cheered. She buried her face in her hands, but CBS7 reports that she wasn’t terribly phased by the incident in a post-match interview.
“It was very unexpected,” she said. “I don’t know, an old guy asking you to twirl. It was funny.” But everyone else, who sat back and watched her get twirly, didn’t take long to jump aboard on the social media opinion-train.
Canadian journalist Signa Butler was one unhappy camper, regarding the request as sexist.
Can we expect Federer to be asked same question? Pathetic. On-court presenter asks Eugenie Bouchard to ‘twirl’ http://t.co/HlghoBEd18
— Signa Butler (@signabutler) January 21, 2015
Writer Adam Pottle suggested violence.
#EugenieBouchard, you should’ve #twirled your racket right into the dude’s face.
— Adam Pottle (@AddyPottle) January 21, 2015
Pop culture reporter Melissa Hoyer added some humility to the situation.
Look forward to Nadal, Federer & Djokovic to do ‘a twirl’ after their games. Could become a thing. http://t.co/pTp75ogqAu via @newscomauHQ
— Melissa Hoyer (@melissahoyer) January 22, 2015
To make matters worse, this isn’t the first time Eugenie’s been embarrassed at the Australian Open. It was just last year that she was asked who her ideal date would be, to which she replied Justin Bieber. Making her admit she’s got a thing for Biebs is humiliating enough, then we went and made the girl twirl.
