Evelyn Reynolds

On all but the two biggest show courts, line calls will be made by Hawk-Eye Live to reduce the number of people on site during the pandemic. More

Ashleigh Barty, the top-ranked women’s singles player, has confirmed that she will not play in the United States Open because of concerns about traveling during the coronavirus pandemic.Barty, 24, soared from outside the top 10 to No. 1 last year when she won the French Open and three other singles titles, including the WTA Finals in Shenzhen, China.She has also confirmed that she will not play the Western & Southern Open, an event normally played near Cincinnati that has been moved to New York this year to be staged at the U.S.T.A. Billie Jean King National Tennis Center ahead of the U.S. Open.The U.S. Open is still set to begin on Aug. 31. The last time the tournament was held without the top women’s singles player was 2010, when Serena Williams withdrew because of a foot injury.“I love both events so it was a difficult decision,” Barty said in a statement sent to Australian media outlets on Thursday. “But there are still significant risks involved due to Covid-19, and I don’t feel comfortable putting my team and I in that position.”Barty, who has been practicing in Brisbane in her native Australia, is the most prominent women’s player to withdraw from the U.S. Open, but she is unlikely to be the last, with No. 2 Simona Halep practicing on clay and committed to playing a clay-court event in Prague that begins on Aug. 10.“I respect every player’s decision,” said Stacey Allaster, the U.S. Open tournament director, who has been pushing hard with her staff to salvage the tournament, which will be played without spectators and with extensive health precautions. “Ash made her decision on what she thinks is best for her and her team. We wish her well, and I am looking forward to seeing her return to play as she is a fan favorite.”The Games ResumeSports and the VirusUpdated July 29, 2020Here’s what’s happening as the world of sports slowly comes back to life:Baseball’s botched return could be a warning for the N.F.L., which is returning without sequestering players. It may be too late for the league to change its plans.Baseball’s woes have the N.B.A. convinced that a “bubble” approach is the only kind that can work for team sports in the Covid-19 era.At least 17 members of the Miami Marlins, including 15 players, tested positive, throwing baseball’s schedule into turmoil.Halep and three other members of the women’s top 10 — No. 5 Elina Svitolina, No. 6 Bianca Andreescu and No. 10 Naomi Osaka — also have not entered the Western & Southern Open, which starts Aug. 20.Andreescu, a Canadian, is the reigning U.S. Open singles champion. Osaka, who represents Japan but has long lived in the United States, won the 2018 U.S. Open singles title and has become one of the sport’s biggest stars.Their management teams did not respond to messages on Wednesday inquiring whether they planned to play in the U.S. Open.Andreescu, 20, has not competed since last October after injuring her knee. She had hoped to return to play in the Miami Open in March, but that event was canceled because of the coronavirus. She initially committed publicly to defending her title at the U.S. Open.In a normal season, players would pay a significant price in the rankings for skipping a Grand Slam event, but both the men’s and women’s tours have adjusted their rankings to allow players to count their best result at an event from 2019 or 2020. That means Andreescu will keep the 2,000 points she acquired from winning the U.S. Open last year regardless of whether she plays this year.But Barty, who reached the fourth round of the U.S. Open in 2018 and 2019, has made it clear for months that she was uncertain about making the journey. Australia’s restrictions on international travel have also been a concern, with Australian citizens requiring an exemption to leave the country and then being required to quarantine for 14 days upon returning.Barty would most likely qualify for an exemption and may still travel to Europe in September to play in clay-court events and defend her French Open title. The French Open is scheduled to begin Sept. 21.“I will make my decision on the French Open and the surrounding WTA European tournaments in the coming weeks,” she said in her statement. More

In a season full of foiled plans and economic peril, the WTA Tour suffered its biggest blow on Thursday when it was forced to cancel its remaining tournaments in 2020 in China, including its lucrative tour championships: the WTA Finals in Shenzhen.The cancellations, confirmed by a tennis official who spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, came two weeks after a Chinese government sports agency recommended that the country call off most international sporting events for the remainder of the year because of the coronavirus pandemic.Steve Simon, the WTA’s chief executive, had expressed hope that China’s government and its tennis officials would allow the tournaments to proceed, just as it was allowing certain winter sports test events to go on ahead of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.Negotiations proved unsuccessful, however, and the women’s tour will now have to cancel all seven events scheduled in October and November in China, which has rapidly become one the tour’s major markets and a key source of revenue.Simon could not immediately be reached for comment on Thursday. But in an interview earlier this month, he spoke about the potential impact of losing the China swing, including the WTA Finals, which provided a record $14 million in prize money in its first year in Shenzhen in 2019 with backing from primary sponsor Shiseido, a Japanese cosmetics company. More

The Citi Open in Washington, D.C., which was scheduled to restart the men’s tennis tour next month, has been canceled for 2020.The tournament was set to begin on Aug. 14 and serve as a lead-in event for the United States Open. But Mark Ein, the Citi Open chairman, said concern about international travel restrictions and recent trends in the coronavirus had led to the cancellation.“When we committed to host the event all the trends were going in our favor, and halfway through the process they all reversed,” Ein said by telephone on Tuesday. “Then we ran out of time. With a little more time we may have been able to overcome the obstacles that were in front of us, but it’s better to make a decision for all the stakeholders before it gets to the last minute.”The decision, made on Monday, will increase doubts about this year’s U.S. Open, which is scheduled to be played without spectators in New York from Aug. 31 to Sept. 13.But Stacey Allaster, the U.S. Open tournament director, reaffirmed Monday that plans remained on track for a doubleheader at the U.S.T.A. Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. The Western & Southern Open is to be played there from Aug. 22 to 28 as a prelude to the U.S. Open, with players and officials operating inside a health and safety “bubble” similar to those being used by the N.B.A. and other leagues. More

2020 was supposed to be a farewell tour for Bob and Mike Bryan, the incomparable tennis twins, who have long been the darlings of doubles. Then coronavirus canceled it. Will they try again? More

For professional tennis players, the coronavirus pandemic has meant canceled tournaments, lost income and frozen rankings, with the men’s and women’s tours putting their systems on hold in mid-March. Rankings are, in many respects, the coin of the tennis realm: the determining factor in players’ ability to enter events, receive seedings and even earn certain […] More

The French Open, played on red-clay courts, is known generally for being the most crowded Grand Slam tournament. Organizers say they are planning for as many as 20,000 fans daily. More

After an outcry from players, the United States Tennis Association has restored the wheelchair tennis competition to the 2020 United States Open. In the initial plans for the tournament announced last week, the wheelchair events, mixed doubles and the junior and legends events had been eliminated. Part of the reasoning for the cuts was the […] More