PARIS — Former world number one
Naomi Osaka
pulled out of Wimbledon on Saturday with an Achilles injury.
اضافة اعلان
“My Achilles
still isn’t right so I’ll see you next time,” the four-time Grand Slam winner
posted on Twitter.
Osaka, 24, was already considering not playing over
the ATP and WTA tours decision to strip Wimbledon of ranking points after the
All England Club banned Russian and
Belarusian players in response to the
invasion of Ukraine.
Osaka’s tweet, although not mentioning Wimbledon
specifically, was accompanied by a photo of herself on a grass court, and an
emoji of a blade of grass.
The Japanese player first suffered the Achilles
problem in her opening match in Madrid in May, the injury forcing her to pull
out of the following Italian Open.
This month she posted a video of a training exercise
on social media accompanied by the caption; “Here’s me running on a underwater
treadmill because my Achilles is being stubborn still I must be aging or
something.”
Osaka’s name had appeared on the singles entry list
for Wimbledon when it was released last week, but she has not featured in any
of the grass-court warm-up events.
Osaka, who has never got beyond the third round at
the
All England Club, raised the possibility of missing the grass-court Grand Slam
after her first-round loss at last month’s French Open.
“I’m leaning more towards not playing given the
current circumstances. I’m the type of player that gets motivated by seeing my
ranking go up,” she said.
“I feel like if I play Wimbledon without points,
it’s more like an exhibition,” she continued.
“The intention of this measure was good, but the
execution is all over the place.”
Osaka’s withdrawal follows that of former Wimbledon
finalist Eugenie Bouchard who pulled out of the season’s third
Grand Slam on
Friday.
The Canadian said the lack of world rankings points
didn’t fit with her plans to manage her return from injury.
Both players’ names were absent from an updated
players’ list.
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