Britain’s Liam Broady says he understands the difficulties any player who is gay in men’s tennis might experience but he hopes they would still be able to be their authentic selves.
At present, there are no openly gay players on the men’s Tour and historically there have been few in the past. Former top 100 player Brian Vahaly came out after retiring from the sport and spoke at length about his journey with Ubitennis. 10-time Grand Slam champion Bill Tilden struggled with his sexuality during a time when gay sex was illegal and not accepted by society.
The situation is the polar opposite of the women’s Tour where the likes of Martina Navratilova and Billie Jean King became some of the first athletes in the world to come out as gay. Meanwhile, world No.8 Daria Kasatkina came out last year and is in a relationship with former figure skater Natalia Zabiiako.
“A football player (Jakub Jankto) came out recently, which is good,” Broady said during an interview with Clay Magazine. “Hopefully it starts to develop like this and more and more people feel comfortable.”
Broady played at the Australian Open earlier this year wearing rainbow laces which are based on an initiative set up by the charity Stonewall to promote LGBT diversity in sport. Following his match against Nick Kyrgios at Melbourne Park, the Brit said he wanted to express his gratitude to the members of the LGBT community who have supported him throughout his career. He also explained that the absence of an openly LGBT player on the men’s Tour makes it more important for people like himself to show their support.
If a player were to come out in the sport, Broady believes the majority of people would support them. A view which has also been expressed by some of his other peers, including Taylor Fritz.
“Same in tennis and in life: most people would be completely normal and be like congratulations, well done, no problem; but there’s always some people maybe that would be close-minded,” he said.
“Maybe that’s why they might think they wouldn’t be accepted by all the players. Maybe they feel that coming out will add pressure to their tennis. I can understand why it is complicated. I hope that if people were, they would feel comfortable to come out and be themselves.”
Broady is currently ranked 132nd in the world and won one Challenger title so far this year which was in Lithuania. More recently, he also was runner-up at the Bield Challenger in Switzerland. This week Broady played at the Banja Luka Open where he came through qualifying before losing in the first round.
As of this week, there are more than 2000 players who are listed on the ATP Pepperstone Rankings.