PEGULA TRIBUTE TO NFL STAR

AMERICAN Jessica Pegula is carrying a piece of home with her on court in Melbourne in tribute to ailing Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin.

Pegula – whose parents own the NFL outfit – has screenprinted a number three decal to her skirt in her Australian Open charge, which progressed to the third round in straight sets – 6-2 7-6 over Aliaksandra Sasnovich – on Wednesday.

Hamlin collapsed earlier this month after he laid a tackle and was rushed to hospital where he spent two days in a coma before making a nearmiraculous recovery to be released from hospital last week.

Pegula said it was important to her to publicly express her support for the 24-year-old oncourt.

“I definitely wanted to do something on my outfit,” she said. “I was in Sydney when it happened so I didn’t have time to do it there, but definitely for Australia.

“I just thought it would be cool to put on my outfit here. I thought it would be a fun way to kind of connect with the team and then also just show my support. I felt like it was such, felt like it was a global event. A lot of people were asking me about it even here.

“It felt kind of special.” But she said some had taken it the wrong way, believing it was a mark of her world ranking.

“Why would you put your ranking on your skirt?,” she laughed.

Pegula’s dismissal of Sasnovich came as potential quarter-finals opponent Maria Sakkari saw red over her opponent’s celebrations.

Unseeded college student Diana Shnaider pushed the No.6 seed to three sets with the Greek star declaring “if she screams one more time in my face, I’m going to call the referee”.

Later, she labelled the celebratory yelling as “not appropriate”.

“I think that during a match you can be very pumped or, you know, the way that some players celebrate their points, it’s not appropriate,” Sakkari said.

“I wasn’t happy with that. But, you know, she never did it again. That was very nice of her.”