Iga Swiatek was involved in a tense altercation with a reporter following her US Open victory over Suzan Lamens.
The 24-year-old, who is bidding to become the first woman to win Wimbledon and US Open singles in the same calendar year since Serena Williams in 2012, recorded a 6-1, 4-6, 6-4 victory over Lamens.
She later admitted to making "some mistakes" across the three-set match, but after pushing through, Swiatek will face No. 29 seed Anna Kalinskaya in Saturday's third round.
After the match, Swiatek took part in a news conference that featured an unusual question from a journalist, who asked if she would wear hair beads in the future.
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The reporter was seemingly referring to Naomi Osaka's viral look at this week's US Open, but the world No.2 had no interest in entertaining the question and made her feelings clear, as seen below.
Moments after the question was asked, Swiatek responded: "What kind of question is that, excuse me? If I wanted to weave beads in my hair? No. What’s going on?"
The reporter responded by walking out of the room.
Reporter explains meaning behind Iga Swiatek question
It appears the question directed at Swiatek was asked by Polish journalist Tomek Moczerniuk, who would later take to social media to address the situation.
“The conversation with Iga got a bit out of hand," he explained on X.
"Unfortunately, I got caught in the crossfire because she didn’t like that I asked if—since New Yorkers like a show—she had ever thought about lightly shocking them, for example, by weaving beads into her hair."
“You need to understand the whole context," added Moczerniuk. "The end of the conference was tense, and I wanted to lighten the mood a bit and ask a casual, relaxed question. But it turned out as it did, and I can’t turn back time. I’ll apologise at the earliest opportunity."
Moczerniuk also responded to a tweet that read: "Good for you trying to own your mess. The bigger issue here is how you showed no capability of reading the room by asking about hair beads which have very clear racial connotations."
He replied: "You are 100% right. Right after we left the press conference, I admitted to @AdamRomer13 that I should’ve read the room better. I was rushed to ask the question and the rest is history. Could have cleaned up much, much better there."
As mentioned previously, Swiatek will take on Anna Kalinskaya in the third round on Saturday.
Jack Kenmare