On June 27, the Wimbledon Championship, the third Grand Slam of the
year, started without the presence of Russian and Belarusian players
in response to the invasion of Ukraine.
The ban has prohibited five male players ranked in the ATP world’s
top 50, including No. 1 Daniil Medvedev and No. 8 Andrey
Rublev, who is supposed to play at Wimbledon. Players also banned
are No .22 Karen Khachanov, No. 43 Aslan Karatsev, and
Belarusian Ilya Ivashka, No. 40. In addition, 13 of the qualified
female players are prohibited to compete because of their
nationality, including No. 13 Daria Kasatkina, No. 22 Veronika
Kudermetova and former world No. 1 Victoria Azarenka.
The World No. 2 player, Alexander Zverev, is not able to compete
this year in Wimbledon because of his serious injury during the
semifinal of French Open against Rafael Nadal.
The United States Tennis Association announced that they will not
be barring Russian and Belarusian players, making Wimbledon the
only Grand Slam tournament to ban players because of the invasion
of Ukraine.
“This horrible atrocity absolutely weighed on all of us,” said Lew
Sherr, the new chief executive of the U.S.T.A., referring to the
Ukrainian War. “But I think at the end of the day we chose not to
hold the individual athletes accountable for the decisions of their
respective governments.”
The drastic change represents the involvement of politics into the
participation of individual athletes in sports events. Experts in
international sports say that the so-called right-to-play principle “ran
headlong into the most significant package of economic sanctions
placed on a country since the end of the Cold War.”
“For years, people would point at sports and athletes and demand
boycotts, and sports could say, ‘Hang on, why are you singling us
out but going on with the rest of your trade?’” said Michael Payne,
the International Olympic Committee’s former director of marketing
and broadcast rights. “But if you have full economic and political
sanctions against a country, then I’m not sure that sports should still
sit it out.”
However, some did not support the ban of the players, including
former world No. 1 Novak Djokovic.
As a child of several wars during the 90s, Djokovic stated that he
understands the feeling of being in this position. “But [on] the other
hand, I can’t say I fully agree to ban Russian tennis players or better
Russian tennis players from competing indefinitely,” Djokovic said
during the pre-tournament press conference of Wimbledon. “I just
don’t see how they have contributed to anything that is really
happening… I feel like they deserve to win [and] to compete.”
Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/27/sports/tennis/wimbledonrussia-liv-pga-saudi.html?searchResultPosition=3
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/25/sports/tennis/wimbledonpolitics-history.html?searchResultPosition=1
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/14/sports/tennis/us-open-russianukraine.html?searchResultPosition=2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpDEAZ3sddI&t=710s
year, started without the presence of Russian and Belarusian players
in response to the invasion of Ukraine.
The ban has prohibited five male players ranked in the ATP world’s
top 50, including No. 1 Daniil Medvedev and No. 8 Andrey
Rublev, who is supposed to play at Wimbledon. Players also banned
are No .22 Karen Khachanov, No. 43 Aslan Karatsev, and
Belarusian Ilya Ivashka, No. 40. In addition, 13 of the qualified
female players are prohibited to compete because of their
nationality, including No. 13 Daria Kasatkina, No. 22 Veronika
Kudermetova and former world No. 1 Victoria Azarenka.
The World No. 2 player, Alexander Zverev, is not able to compete
this year in Wimbledon because of his serious injury during the
semifinal of French Open against Rafael Nadal.
The United States Tennis Association announced that they will not
be barring Russian and Belarusian players, making Wimbledon the
only Grand Slam tournament to ban players because of the invasion
of Ukraine.
“This horrible atrocity absolutely weighed on all of us,” said Lew
Sherr, the new chief executive of the U.S.T.A., referring to the
Ukrainian War. “But I think at the end of the day we chose not to
hold the individual athletes accountable for the decisions of their
respective governments.”
The drastic change represents the involvement of politics into the
participation of individual athletes in sports events. Experts in
international sports say that the so-called right-to-play principle “ran
headlong into the most significant package of economic sanctions
placed on a country since the end of the Cold War.”
“For years, people would point at sports and athletes and demand
boycotts, and sports could say, ‘Hang on, why are you singling us
out but going on with the rest of your trade?’” said Michael Payne,
the International Olympic Committee’s former director of marketing
and broadcast rights. “But if you have full economic and political
sanctions against a country, then I’m not sure that sports should still
sit it out.”
However, some did not support the ban of the players, including
former world No. 1 Novak Djokovic.
As a child of several wars during the 90s, Djokovic stated that he
understands the feeling of being in this position. “But [on] the other
hand, I can’t say I fully agree to ban Russian tennis players or better
Russian tennis players from competing indefinitely,” Djokovic said
during the pre-tournament press conference of Wimbledon. “I just
don’t see how they have contributed to anything that is really
happening… I feel like they deserve to win [and] to compete.”
Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/27/sports/tennis/wimbledonrussia-liv-pga-saudi.html?searchResultPosition=3
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/25/sports/tennis/wimbledonpolitics-history.html?searchResultPosition=1
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/14/sports/tennis/us-open-russianukraine.html?searchResultPosition=2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpDEAZ3sddI&t=710s
