“I cried about 30 minutes at 2 in the morning”: Marta Kostyuk reflects on backlash from Brisbane speech

Marta Kostyuk referred to the controversy raised by her speech after the final of the Brisbane International a week ago. The world No. 20 had a remarkable campaign to reach the final, including three top-10 wins along the way, but ended up defeated by world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka in the final.

The Ukrainian was left empty-handed after reaching deep in her first tournament of the season. However, much of the commentary in the tennis world focused on her speech during the trophy ceremony, in which she did not congratulate her rival Sabalenka.

“I want to say a few words about Ukraine,” Kostyuk said during the ceremony, emphasizing the difficult situation in her country. “It’s very hot here in Brisbane, so it’s difficult to imagine this, but my sister is sleeping under three blankets because of how cold it is at home.”

Since the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war, Kostyuk has been one of the most vocal players on the matter. Like other Ukrainian players, she has refused handshakes with Russian or Belarusian rivals. Kostyuk has repeatedly criticized Sabalenka, and after the speech, the topic became widely discussed on social media.

The world No. 20 gave an interview with the Ukrainian media outlet Tribuna, where she referred to the reactions following her speech. “I did a not very smart thing – namely, I opened Twitter. I read all this beauty that people wrote,” she said. “That night I slept very badly, I went to bed at 4 in the morning, I cried for about 30 minutes at 2 in the morning. For me, it is still so shocking and so incomprehensible.”

Kostyuk explained in the interview that she did not want to enter into controversy with her speech, and that, on the contrary, she avoided explicitly mentioning the war to prevent controversies. “I have many questions, but the most important one, probably: how can you say that I politicized something if I didn’t say a word about the war? I didn’t say the word ‘war,’ I didn’t mention Russia, I didn’t mention Belarus.”

“I just stated the fact that all of Ukraine is now sitting without electricity and water and is simply freezing – and for me this is a huge pain. Because, as I said, my sister sleeps under three blankets and walks around the house in thermal underwear,” the 23-year-old added. “People started writing to me like this – it was just a shock for me. Then I talked to my mother. They started writing to me, like: ‘You earned the prize – send it to your sister so she doesn’t freeze,’ ‘You’re a millionaire, take your family out of Ukraine.’

Then, of course, about the fact that I didn’t mention Aryna. I disagree here, because I couldn’t mention Aryna. I just thanked all my rivals this week. I think Aryna understands perfectly well why I didn’t mention her – and I think she’s absolutely fine with that.”

“Regarding handshakes – to be honest, it starts a big chain of bots. I have it after every match. Especially if it’s some big match, I start to have hundreds of comments under posts, hundreds of messages, Russian flags, ‘Putin is the best.’ It’s about the same here.

So, regarding handshakes. The fourth year of a full-scale war – does it still affect you in any way? It didn’t matter to me. It was this politicization that really affected me, because in every speech I make in the finals, I mention Ukraine – in all the finals. But for some reason, only this speech caused such a resonance – probably because the other finalist of the tournament was Aryna.

Although for me it makes absolutely no difference who my opponent is in the final. I always mention Ukraine in my speech, because this is the most important moment of the week in tennis – the final and its speech. Therefore, not mentioning Ukraine is a problem for me. I always mention Ukraine, and especially today.”

Kostyuk said she also received messages from her compatriots thanking her for her words at the end of the tournament, and confirmed that she deleted her social media to stop seeing hate or controversy around this type of situation.

“So many Ukrainians wrote to me after this speech: ‘I’m sitting under two blankets, I haven’t had light for three days, but I’m watching your match. Thank you very much for your words.’ Of course, this made me… I can’t say that it made me happy, because I don’t want any of this to happen at all, it’s not normal that it is, but such words of support really warmed me up, especially in this wave of hate.

“And I just deleted all social media after that. I don’t read anything, I don’t watch anything, because I know what I’m doing, I know what I did – and I didn’t do anything bad, I didn’t say anything bad about anyone.

I think I said an important message. I don’t want people to forget about it, I want people to continue to support Ukraine, not get used to it, not get used to the fact that it’s normal to sit without light, sit without water, freeze. All my friends have an apartment temperature of 15 degrees. This is abnormal, it shouldn’t be like this.”