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01st Jun 2021

Piers Morgan calls Naomi Osaka a ‘brat’ for not speaking to press despite his own TV tantrum

Claudia McInerney

This comes after Osaka refused to speak to the media to protect her mental health

The professional tennis player Naomi Osaka recently refused to appear in press conferences during the French Open Roland-Garros tournament in Paris.

Osaka said that she made the decision to “skip the press conferences” in order to protect her mental health and well-being. She was subsequently fined for her decision.

On Instagram, the 23-year-old later announced that that she had made the decision to withdraw from the tournament due to ongoing mental health struggles.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CPi9kJHJfxO/

However Piers Morgan, who is well-known for voicing his bold opinions, criticised the player in his recent MailOnline column, referring to Osaka as an “arrogant spoiled brat whose fame and fortune appears to have inflated her ego to gigantic proportions.”

He said: “How else to explain her extraordinary decision to announce she will no longer participate in media press conferences, supposedly to protect her mental health?”

On Instagram, Osaka said in a post: “I’ve watched many clips of athletes breaking down after a loss in the press room and I know you have as well. I believe that whole situation is kicking a person while they’re down and I don’t understand the reasoning behind it.”

However Morgan said “This has got nothing to do with mental health.

“What Osaka really means is that she doesn’t want to face the media if she hasn’t played well, because the beastly journalists might actually dare to criticize her performance, and she’s not going to ‘subject’ herself to ‘people that doubt me.'”

Despite calling Osaka a “spoiled brat” for avoiding to speak to the media, Morgan himself received criticism after he stormed off set live on Good Morning Britain in March earlier this year before quitting the ITV show.

Morgan was being pressed on his views about Meghan Markle by Alex Beresford when he decided he did not need to listen to him anymore and walked off the live set.

People have taken to social media to call out Piers Morgan for the issue in light of his new column for the MailOnline.