Teen Coaching

Romanian tennis player says she ‘deserved’ to be hit by father

• Tennis star Ioana Andrada Surdeanu, 16, was slapped by her father
• Her father, who is also her coach, hit her twice because she lost a match
• Miss Surdeanu was left with blood streaming down her face
• Umpires called the police who arrested her father at the tennis court
• Amazingly she has defended him, saying she ‘deserved’ her punishment

Andrada Surdeanu, 16, comes to her father’s defence after a violent altercation when she lost a match left her with a bloody nose

A Romanian teenage tennis player said she „deserved” to be hit by her father, who is also her coach, after she was left with a bloody nose following a violent argument when she lost a game.

Sixteen-year-old Andrada Surdeanu was seen by a doctor during a tournament in the northern Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona after her father Lucian, a former air-force pilot, struck her around the head.

She said that she had argued with father after crashing out of the tournament in the quarter-finals.

He had tried to confiscate her mobile phone as punishment, but when she refused he slapped her in the face.

Mr Surdeanu was detained overnight by police in order to „cool off” and fined, but despite her father’s violence Miss Surdeanu has leapt to his defence.

„My father is not a beast, he didn’t break my nose; I didn’t have my face covered in blood. It’s true, he slapped me once. So what? I deserved it,” she wrote on her Facebook page.

„It was my fault because I’ve yelled and said some words to him. I was irresponsible after all the sacrifices he made for me. I admit that I was scared in that moment, but I know he regrets what he did and he loves me,” she continued.

„Nobody says that he didn’t do anything wrong, but he doesn’t deserve to be treated like this. I want my father back because I love him.”

The teenage tennis player admitted she now has trouble sleeping and is haunted by an image of her father in the back of a police car.

Mr Surdeanu’s name has joined a list of other fathers from the tennis world known for their short tempers.

French star Mary Pierce had to get a restraining order placed on her father Jim owing to his tendency to verbally abuse her during tournaments.

Dazmir Dokic, the tempestuous father of Jelena, was kicked out Wimbledon in 2000 for breaking a journalist’s camera, and was once ejected from a tournament after calling officials Nazis and accusing them of supporting the Nato bombing of Yugoslavia.

After his outburst, Mr Surdeanu may have to find a new job as he now faces the prospect of being banned from the sport by the Romanian Tennis Federation.

Miss Surdeanu said: „I’ve played tennis for 10 years, and I have the feeling that this episode is going to follow me for the rest of my life. Maybe I want to go to a tennis academy in the United States, to play there. But who will accept me if they know I was hit by my father?”