Mick Hartley

Rude, certainly, and not at all the sort of behaviour one expects from our charming and fragrant lady tennis players….but funny nonetheless:

Harriet Dart asked an umpire to tell her French opponent to wear deodorant after claiming “she smells really bad” during a heavy defeat in Rouen.

In comments picked up by court-side microphones, the Briton attacked Lois Boisson’s personal hygiene during an ill-tempered 6-0, 6-3 humbling for Dart. The unkind public comments leave her potentially at risk of action for unsporting behaviour from the WTA.

Dart had addressed the umpire as she got to her feet shortly after Boisson walked past her during the second set of her first-round encounter in the Rouen Open. “Can you tell her to wear deodorant,” Dart asked. With the umpire seemingly confused, she then seemed to repeat the question, “Because the smell,” Dart said. “Can you tell her to wear deodorant? She smells really bad.”

Bravely reviving that favourite old theme in British comedy about the French and their personal hygiene – the Monty Python Montgolfier brothers, for instance.