Women's Tennis Star Maria Sakkari Complains About Weed Smell During U.S. Open

No. 8 seeded Greek women's tennis player Maria Sakkari lost to 71st ranked Spanish player Rebeka Masarova in a stunning upset during the first day of the U.S. Open in Queens on Monday. But before her opponent turned things around, Sakkari had complained about the smell of "weed" coming from a nearby park.

The 28-year-old had been up 4–1 in the first set when she signaled to complain about the smell to the chair umpire. From there, Masarova rallied for five straight games to win the set. She ended up besting Sakkari in both the first and second set for a final score of 6–4, 6–4.

"It was weed,” Sakkari later clarified in a post-match press conference. "The smell, oh my gosh. I think it’s from the park." However, she didn't blame the odor for her performance, which saw 18 unforced errors over the course of the match.

"It wasn’t the smell that affected the score in any way. It was just a comment because I didn’t expect to smell it. But it has nothing to do with the match,” Sakkari explained. "You don’t really think about it, because all you care is to win the match. I smelled it, but that was it. It was not something I paid attention of."

She noted that she had smelled weed when she was practicing at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center on Sunday, but called it "irrelevant."

"Sometimes it smells food, sometimes it smells cigarettes, sometimes it smells weed," Sakkari added. "It’s something that we cannot control because we’re in an open space. There’s a park behind, people can do whatever they want. It’s nothing that we can control."

Sakkari's loss on Monday effectively has her eliminated from Grand Slam events, after suffering eight Round 1 losses in her 31 main draw appearances, according to the U.S. Open website. Before this, her most recent loss occurred at Wimbledon this year.