TENNIS ace Naomi Osaka has revealed that Meghan Markle reached out to her to offer her support after she stepped down from the French Open.
The Duchess of Sussex is one of many famous faces who reportedly wanted to support the young tennis star after she quit amid the controversy over her press briefings.
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Osaka, 23, said that she had an outpouring of support from people in the public eye including Michele Obama and fellow sports stars Michael Phelps, Steph Curry and Novak Djokovic.
She hit the headlines in May after announcing that she would not speak to media during the French Open, tweeting that she found the briefings like “kicking a person while they’re down”.
The Japanese megastar hit out at organisations for “ignoring” the mental health of athletes, and was hit with a $15,000 fine by officials after failing to go to a press conference following her first-round match on May 30.
The four Grand Slam organizers issued a joint statement warning she would face “more substantial fines and future Grand Slam suspensions” if she continued her boycott.
She has now spoken out about the importance of protecting sports people’s mental health in an Olympic preview issue of Time magazine.
Meghan Markle had revealed just over two months before Osaka’s game that she herself had struggled with mental health.
Speaking in an explosive interview with Oprah, the Duchess of Sussex opened up about her own experience with depression, saying she had also faced suicidal thoughts.
The Duke of Sussex told Oprah in a new doc, The Me You Can’t See, that what stopped his wife from giving in to suicidal was how “unfair” it would be to him after the death of his mum Princess Diana in 1997.
Meghan broke down in tears as she revealed she told Prince Harry she “didn’t want to be alive any more” and had suicidal thoughts in a shocking tell-all interview with Oprah.
The Duchess of Sussex said she begged for help from the Firm after struggling with her mental health – saying it was her husband who “saved” her.
In the cover issue of the magazine Osaka has called for sports starrs to be allowed to use “sick days” in order to normalise skipping press conferences without having to explain themselves.
She also pointed out that personal or mental health days are given to workers in most other industries, and that it would bring sport “in line” with the rest of society.
Osaka found herself in the middle of a storm in May after she refused to attend a press conference at the French Open for mental health reasons.
She pulled out of the tournament and has also skipped Wimbledon, and has since revealed that she struggles with depression and anxiety.
She will return to competition at the Tokyo Olympics, which open July 23, and where she will represent her native Japan.
The four-time Grand Slam champion said: “I have numerous suggestions to offer the tennis hierarchy.
“But my No. 1 suggestion would be to allow a small number of ‘sick days’ per year where you are excused from your press commitments without having to disclose your personal reasons.
“In any other line of work, you would be forgiven for taking a personal day here and there, so long as it’s not habitual.
