Aussie Destanee Aiava records huge win after body-shaming acts

Young Aussie tennis player Destanee Aiava picked up a huge Australian Open win after destroying some body-shaming trolls.

Warning: This article contains confronting subject matter

Destanee Aiava has sadly had to face two obstacles during her current Australian Open qualifying campaign — her on-court competitors and some disgraceful online trolls.

The Australian celebrated a huge achievement on Thursday when she overcame Germany’s Eva Lys 6-1 2-6 6-4 to ensure her place in the tournament’s main draw for the first time since 2021.

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It was the 24-year-old’s third win in four gruelling days to reach the first round proper, which comes with a guaranteed $A132,000 payday regardless of her opening result.

But Aiava, who has detailed her mental health battles in the past, has also been fighting a very different and very public battle online.

The Victorian has this week been wearing the same outfits donned by some tennis standouts from years gone by, including Maris Sharapova’s attire from the 2012 US Open and Ana Ivanovic’s purple ensemble from the 2009 Australian Open, which Aiava wore on Thursday.

Destanee Aiava and Maria Sharapova. Photos: Supplied/Getty Images

Many celebrated Aiava’s style, including well-known tennis reporter Ben Rothenberg, who tweeted a split photo of Aiava and Sharapova wearing the same outfit, which he captioned a “fun archival fashion moment”.

Others wrote comments like “liking her style”, “who is this queen” and “these are so good, hope she keeps going!”

Yet some gutless cowards have chosen to take shots at the world No. 165.

In a post that has since been deleted, an account called @stfukarran wrote: “Not to hate or body shame anyone but Destanee Aiava needs to lose some weight to get more quick on her feet imo.”

To her immense credit, Aiava fired back at the troll, writing: “Shut the f**k up. ‘Not to hate’ or ‘body shame’ and then you went and hated and body shamed.”

In a separate reply, Aiava wrote: “Good job triggering my ED (eating disorder).”

The user, whose profile includes other body-shaming and also homophobic tweets, replied saying they were “extremely sorry”, to which Aiava wrote “thank u for ur apology”.

Aiava reacts after reaching the main draw on Thursday. Picture: Michael Klein

Before having an emotional moment with her mum. Picture: Michael Klein

In perhaps an even worse post, an account called @Maribeaut commented on the same Sharapova-Aiava photo that Rothenberg posted, saying: “Omg why would she wear a dress that doesn’t suit her at all? She made a mess of the outfit with her unproportionate body, her bulges covering the dress design.”

What somehow makes that comment even worse, the bio of that account stated “personal insult and swearing=BLOCK” and includes an Australian flag and a photo of Sydney Harbour.

Aiava replied to that post: “Omg thank you so much. I love how your bio says ‘personal insult and swearing reply = block’ and then you go and comment a personal insult.”

Not surprisingly, that account has since changed its bio to remove that reference.

As is almost always the case, neither of those accounts uses a proper name that can actually identify them, in keeping with the pathetic keyboard warrior mantra.

There were some strong replies to that Maribeaut comment, including this from Carol Bass: “You are disgraceful Maribel. If you can’t say something nice just don’t comment at all.”

Another wrote: “Omg why would you say that to anybody let alone somebody who’s upfront about her mental health, exactly how dumb are you?”

Following her victory over Hungary’s Panna Advardy on Wednesday, Aiava was asked if she had been impacted by the comments.

Not surprisingly, she replied: “I was. It’s not nice to see those comments.

“I don’t really look for them. Sometimes I look my name up just to find photos of my matches and then I see the bad stuff.

“I’ve been told to bite my tongue but I don’t really like to.”

Nor should she.

It all makes her effort to make the main draw even more admirable and Aiava shared an embrace with mum Rosie after her victory on Thursday.

“It means so much, my mum has sacrificed so much,” she said after the win. “I was with her every single day of pre-season, just working my arse off.

“I just thought play free, don’t think ahead, because I know I’ve done it before here as well, and I didn’t get through.

“I really wanted to just clear my mind. All I thought about was the next serve.”

Two years ago, Aiava was in a terrible place in her life and posted online that she had planned to commit suicide on Easter Sunday, 2022, just weeks before her 22nd birthday.

Thankfully, as Aiava said in an Instagram post at the time, passers by stopped and convinced her not to go through with it and she is now progressing in her promising tennis career.

She has been drawn to face Belgian world No. 94 Greet Minnen in the Australian Open first round.

Destanee Aiava’s Instagram post from 2022. Picture: Instagram

Aiava was also a member of the Australian side for this year’s United Cup teams event in Sydney.

Clearly happy to speak her mind, Aiava filmed some live blogs during the tournament for her YouTube page.

In one of them, Aiava said she was impressed with the organisation of the event, but had major issues with the supposed team environment of the Australian side, which was captained by Lleyton Hewitt.

Watch part of Aiava’s vlog in the video player at the top of the page

“Everything’s gone smoothly, there haven’t been any issues so far, so far I’ve had a good time at the event itself,” she said.

“Regarding our team, yeah, it’s not felt so welcoming. I understand we’re in a competitive environment, but I thought playing a team event, it would feel a bit different.

“It just feels like we’re all here for ourselves, which is pretty much what I expected.

“It’s not team-based at all. We pretty much just do whatever we want by ourselves and then when everyone has to play, that’s when we all come together as a ‘team’.

Alex de Minaur and Olivia Gadecki competing for Australia in this year’s United Cup. (Photo by Brett Hemmings/Getty Images)

“And we have to watch and support. I don’t know, I just find that kind of dumb.

“I don’t want to say anything that will get me cancelled, I probably will though, but there’s been at most two people I’ve actually properly conversed with on the team. Maybe three.

“It’s very weird and it’s hostile and it’s not welcoming at all. That’s my review.”

Alex de Minaur and Olivia Gadecki played both singles matches the Australian team contested at the tournament and also teamed up for a mixed doubles match.

The other mixed doubles was contested by Matthew Ebden and Ellen Perez, with the host nation failing to progress from the group stage following a 1-1 record.

Aiava found the lack of communication “weird”.

“I still don’t know if I’m playing today or not and I just find that a bit weird,” she said at the time.

“I feel like people should have made a decision last night, I didn’t really get a concrete answer.

“It’s just odd. This whole thing, not the tournament itself but the team experience has made me just want to go home and not come back.

“I just can’t wait to come home.”

Originally published as Aussie Destanee Aiava records huge win after body-shaming acts