In doing so, Knight draws facial features reflecting the dehumanising Jim Crow caricatures so common in the 19th and 20th centuries. Knight's cartoon conjures up a range of such caricatures that were branded on memorabilia and popularised on stage and screen of the era, including the minstrel-show character Topsy born out of Uncle Tom's Cabin, as well as the title character in 1899's Little Black Sambo. Loading Such caricatures were parodied in the '60s by underground comix creator R. Crumb through his character Angelfood McSpade. Spike Lee – who, while attending an earlier US Open round, hailed Williams' greatness as on par with Muhammad Ali's – created a powerful montage of such racist pop-culture caricatures in his 2000 film Bamboozled. In Saturday's women's final, Ramos charged Williams with three violations, including a game violation, as Osaka – the 20-year-old rising star who is of Japanese and Haitian descent – went on to defeat Williams in straight sets. Knight's sendup of that match is being criticised for how he caricatured both finalists. His Osaka figure – given her light skin, thin frame and entirely blond hair – looks like a small white woman, some critics say.

Loading Author J.K. Rowling wrote on Twitter: "Well done on reducing one of the greatest sportswomen alive to racist and sexist tropes and turning a second great sportswoman into a faceless prop." And British journalist Charles Thomson tweeted: "In 100 years' time, this cartoon will be viewed no differently than old images of Jim Crow, or the newspaper cartoons drawn of Jack Johnson. Mark Knight has just drawn his way into the history books." Thomson's words note how Williams's athletic forebears – such great black champions of the early 20th century as boxers Jack Johnson and Joe Louis – were often depicted in cartoons of the era via Sambo caricatures.

Knight responded on Twitter to US sportswriter Julie DiCaro who accused him of not treating male players the same way by posting an older cartoon he'd drawn of Nick Kyrgios: "Don't bring gender into it when it's all about behaviour," he wrote. In early August, for a cartoon about train-station safety in Victoria, Knight also faced ire for how he drew faceless black figures fighting in the background.

Backlash against the image included disgust from Melbourne councillor Rohan Leppert, who wrote: "The racist vilification of Melburnians from the Herald Sun continues apace. Utterly shameful." Others have come to Knight's defence. Herald Sun editor Damon Johnston took to Twitter to insist that the cartoon was neither racist or sexits, adding that Knight "has the full support of everyone at the Herald Sun". Herald and Weekly Times managing director Peter Blunden tweeted that the cartoon was "about bad behaviour, certainly not race".

Radio presenter Neil Mitchell also backed the cartoonist, saying on 3AW on Tuesday morning that those who see Knight's depiction of Williams as racist "are wrong". "It didn’t even cross my mind it was meant to be racially offensive," Mitchell said. “It was a sports bully, throwing a tantrum.” Knight said he had been unprepared for the intense backlash. “The world’s gone crazy,” he told Mitchell. “It’s a cartoon about poor behaviour, it’s nothing to do with race. “I drew this cartoon on Monday night, I saw the world’s greatest tennis player spit the dummy.

“She’s great to draw, she’s a powerful figure, she’s strongly built. “I’m sorry it’s been taken by social media and distorted so much. “I’ve tried to reply to these people but they don’t listen.” The Australian, the Herald Sun's News Corp stablemate, was involved in a similar controversy in 2016 over a cartoon by Bill Leak depicticting a thick-lipped Aboriginal child being held by the collar by a policeman. In that cartoon the child's father holds a beer can and does not know his son's name. It caused a torrent of complaints about racist stereotyping.

Washington Post, Fairfax Media