Naomi Osaka Raises Nearly 50K For Haiti

By NAN Staff Writer

News Americas, MIAMI, FL. Fri. Aug. 20 2021: Haitian-roots tennis star, Naomi Osaka’s run at the Western & Southern Open was cut short Thursday night but she still managed to raise some US $50,000 for her father’s homeland.

Osaka, born in Japan to a Haitian father and a Japanese mother, had pledged ahead of the tournament to donate any winnings to relief efforts in Haiti following the August 14, 2021, earthquake. But she lost on Thursday night to Jil Teichmann 3-6, 6-3, 6-3, ending her hope to make it to the end.

“I’m kind of sad now that I couldn’t have gone further, but I think the main thing was to raise awareness and I feel like I did that pretty well. Overall, I’m just glad that we were able to contribute something,” Osaka said after walking away with $24,200 in prize money for her third-round appearance. Doubled with a matched donation from the tournament’s title sponsor, the Western & Southern Financial Group, she raised $48,400.

Osaka’s loss to Teichmann marks her second-straight third round loss. She was eliminated by Marketa Vondrousova in the third round at the Tokyo Olympics last month.

“I also thought that my performance in Tokyo was lingering in my mind a bit because I felt like I was a little too aggressive there,” she said Thursday, via the Cincinnati Enquirer. “I feel like I learned a lot from this match today and I thought that if there’s anything to take away from this, I tried my best throughout the entire match.”

More than 2,100 people had died as of Wednesday night and more than 12,000 people have been injured so far. The earthquake — which came about a month after former president Jovenel Moise was assassinated — struck about five miles from the town of Petit Trou de Nippes in the southwestern part of Haiti.