“I’ll Beat You!” Chinese Tennis Star Zheng Qinwen Responds To Racial Slur During US Open Match

It seems winning the tennis women’s singles gold at the Paris Olympics proved the perfect motivator for Chinese tennis player Zheng Qinwen.

The 21-year-old from Hubei bested Croatia’s Donna Vekic 7-6(2), 4-6 at the US Open round of 16 on Monday (Sep 2).

This makes Qinwen the second Chinese woman – after retired two-time Grand Slam winner Li Na — to reach the quarterfinals twice at the U.S. Open.

This is also the second time Qinwen defeated Donna since the singles finals at the Olympics.

Qinwen is set to face World No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka in the quarterfinals today (Sep 4).

However, it seems friendliness wasn’t a theme at the US Open.

According to netizens who attended the event, someone in the audience shouted “Yellow banana!”  in the middle of the match.

‘Yellow banana’ is a racial slur used on someone of a ethnic Chinese background.

Qinwen was caught hotly responding in English “I’ll beat you!” before winning the match.

After the incident, the comments were fired up with Qinwen’s supporters who also joked that provoking the tennis player just gave her more energy to win.

“She looked so angry! It probably gave her more motivation to beat Donna,” read a comment.

One netizen even praised Qinwen for “fighting racism” and said, “When white people can’t beat you fairly, they will always resort to racism.”

Another also noted that both Qinwen and Donna are known to be less than friendly in their interactions with each other.

In an interview with a Croatian daily during the Olympics, Donna admitted she wasn’t a fan of Qingwen’s constant delays on her serve during the match.

Donna also hinted in the interview that her disapproval of Qinwen was due to “controversial stories” but refused to elaborate.

American tennis player once openly told Qinwen that she didn’t respect the latter as a player due to her “cut-throat behaviour” on the courts.

Sounds like a case of sour grapes to us.