First-round winner Michael Zheng has already earned $225,000 at this Australian Open, an amount that will continue to increase as he goes deeper in the tournament.
But the American qualifier doesn’t know if he can accept a cent of it.
Michael Zheng was the winner of the first round of this year’s Australian Open.Credit: AP
Zheng attends and plays tennis for Columbia University in the US, and National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) rules state that full-time student-athletes may only receive awards that cover their actual and necessary expenses to participate in the event.
The 21-year-old Ivy League student battled through the qualifiers before upsetting fellow American Sebastian Korda in five sets, which would normally guarantee him at least $US225,000 ($150,667) even if he loses a second-round match.
“I’ll talk to our head coach. [and] try to figure out what it’s like to win, if I can take it or not,” said Zheng, who is ranked 174th in the world, after defeating Korda.
Australian Rinky Hijikata, who played college tennis for the University of North Carolina (UNC) from 2019-21, did not mince words about Zheng’s unfortunate situation.
“It’s not right when you’re a college athlete and you get paid a million dollars for a utility car, but then you know Michael’s here kicking ass.” [for potentially no financial reward]” said Hijikata.
“He won three rounds of qualifying, beat someone in the top 30 in the world and he can’t get a reward for that. Yeah, I don’t know if I agree with that.”
An example of Hijikata’s commercial car sales is a reference to the NCAA’s name, image and likeness policy, which allows college athletes, mostly in American football and basketball, to earn millions of dollars while maintaining eligibility.
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