Tennis icon Yannick Noah was one of several prominent victims of the infamous Hollywood catfish Whitney Walton. The former French Open champion, who is reprising his role as Team Europe captain at the Laver Cup this weekend, was an unfortunate member of a sizeable list of stars that fell for the scammer's scheme, having gifted her money and jewellery.
Hollywood scammer's victims
Walton, who went by the name Miranda Grosvenor during her conning days, had swooned the likes of Robert De Niro, Billy Joel and Quincy Jones on the telephone. The matter of Walton, who died in 2016, was raised with the French sporting icon during a recent interview with the Telegraph.
Noah said of the situation: "Sometimes you can be in a situation where you don’t even realise how fragile life is, because you are surrounded by everything that glitters. You feel strong, but you are actually the weakest you have ever been. I was lost. My questions were genuine about the meaning of life – and nothing to do with the Monty Python film."
Noah's reaction to the revelation
The former tennis player turned singer, who sold four million records, released his French-language autobiography Secrets etc... in 1997. A portion of a review of Noah's autobiography was put forward to the 66-year-old in the interview, which said he "allowed himself to be seduced into thinking that a woman he had never met except via telephone was the woman of his dreams".
After the comment was put to Noah, he chuckled and said: "Whitney Walton. Look her up. You gonna see I was one of the guys she seduced. You gonna read something very interesting, very funny."
Focus on Laver Cup revenge
Although unfortunate, the catfish situation is a thing of the past for Noah, who is fully focused on exacting revenge on Team World after they captured the Laver Cup last year. Helped by vice-captain Tim Henman for the second year in a row, Noah has quite the cast of stars to help bring the accolade back to Europe.
Team Europe will be represented by Alexander Zverev, Carlos Alcaraz, Flavio Cobolli, Rafael Jodar, Jakub Mensik, Casper Ruud and Arthur Fery.
