Balkan Blood Feud Boils Over At Australian Open
Hooligans: they aren’t just for soccer anymore! In what’s becoming a regular occurrence at the Australian Open, scores of ethnic Serbs and Croats have chosen a tennis match as the tableau to act out their anger in their centuries-old rivalry. The occasion on Friday was the third round match where Serbian Novak Djokovic beat Bosnian-born American Amer Delic. The SYDNEY HERALD SUN reports that at least 30 people were kicked out of Rod Laver Stadium, and one woman was knocked unconscious by a chair.
As you can imagine, alcohol was partially to blame. THE TIMES OF LONDON notes that the beer was flowing on the tennis grounds bright and early thanks to one of the tournament sponsors, always a guarantee to fuel bad blood. Let’s see: a bunch of drunken idiots hurling lawn chairs at each other until the cops show up to break it up? Sounds like every frat party I ever went to in college, except with the added bonus of racial strife and undercurrents of genocide.
Video of the melee after the jump:
