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    Caroline Wozniacki Is Getting Very Good at Comebacks

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    Wozniacki keeps finding magic at the U.S. Open, but she’s not the only player enjoying a revival. Stan Wawrinka and Elina Svitolina also can’t find the exits.America likes to fancy itself the land of second chances. Show some humility. Work hard. A new you, or perhaps a better version of the old you, is just around the corner.So perhaps it’s fitting that comebacks have featured so prominently in the first days of the U.S. Open. Some have gone well — Caroline Wozniacki, Elina Svitolina, Stan Wawrinka, Jennifer Brady. Others — Venus Williams, who suffered an opening night drubbing — not so much.What binds them together though, is the seemingly irresistible pull of a sport and a life that so many players complain about but ultimately struggle to say goodbye to, knowing that once the door locks completely, as it does for everyone eventually, there is no way to unlock the pathway to the international glamour, fame and money of their former life.“It’s the competition,” said Brady, 28, who is rediscovering her form following two injury-plagued and mentally grueling years. “You just can’t replicate it.”That’s not all. On Thursday, there was the 38-year-old Wawrinka in the fading light of Court 17, which is a kind of tennis bullring, rolling back the years to a time before foot surgeries seemed to spell the end. He had just dispatched Tomas Etcheverry, who is 14 years his junior, in four gritty sets, rallying the capacity crowd of 2,800 which had been screaming for him all afternoon. He stirred them like an orchestra conductor, urging each bank of stands to get louder to earn their post-match, souvenir ball.“I like the emotion I get from tennis,” Wawrinka said later. “I also know the day I stop I will never find those emotions anywhere.”Friday afternoon’s third round delivered a tense, three-set battle between dueling comeback stories, as Wozniacki, 33, a former world No. 1 playing her first Grand Slam following a three-year, two-pregnancy retirement, outlasted Brady.It was the second time in three days that Wozniacki had found the old magic in Arthur Ashe Stadium, where she had her breakout run to the her first Grand Slam final 14 years ago. On Wednesday, she topped an old rival and two-time Wimbledon champion, Petra Kvitova, in two tight sets under the lights. On Friday, she came back from a set down against Brady, an Australian Open finalist in 2021, winning 12 of the final 14 games. She said three years ago she never thought she would be competing on this court again, much less winning.“What an honor this is,” she said Friday.Stan Wawrinka stole the show on Court 17 on Thursday, beating the much-younger Tomas Etcheverry in four sets.Amir Hamja/The New York TimesIt is fitting that Wawrinka and Wozniacki are clicking once more here. This is the tournament where Jimmy Connors went on his storied run to the semifinals in 1991 when he was 39. It’s where, in 2009, Kim Clijsters, took a wild-card entry and in just her second tournament back after a two-year break won the singles title.The enduring image of that night was Clijsters’s toddler daughter running across the court during the trophy ceremony. Her opponent in that final — Wozniacki.If ever there was a player that seemed done for good, Wozniacki was it.She had been playing almost her entire life. She had fulfilled her childhood dreams of reaching the top of the rankings and in 2018 winning a Grand Slam tournament title at the Australian Open. She had won $35 million in prize money and earned tens of millions more in endorsements.When Wozniacki left the sport in 2020, she had spent the previous two years battling ​rheumatoid arthritis, a chronic inflammatory disease that sometimes left her joints so swollen she struggled to get out of bed. She and her husband, David Lee, a retired N.B.A. player, were raising their two children in Florida, and Wozniacki had become a mainstay of tennis television commentary.The Wozniackis have always been an intense sports family. Her father played soccer for Denmark and Poland and her mother played volleyball for Poland. For Wozniacki, a fitness freak, tennis was a profession but also a cardio workout. But she did not play for so long during her temporary retirement that when the day arrived that she wanted to hit some balls she had no idea where her rackets were.The ball started coming off her strings as soundly as she felt it ever had.“I realized that, yes, I love playing tennis,” she said. “I love to play the game, I’m very passionate about it, and I want to be the best I possibly can be.”Pretty soon she was floating the idea of a comeback to her father, who has always been her coach, and her husband, who essentially said, ‘why not, you only live once.’ Now here she is in New York, with the kids in tow, taking her 3-year-old daughter, Olivia, to a park near her hotel in the morning, and competing for one of the biggest titles in the sport in the afternoon and evening. On off days she has been going to museums.“Pretty cool that I get to live my passion and be a mom and kind of wear many hats,” she said Friday after yet another win in a Grand Slam after so many years of them.There are, of course, different ways to go about a comeback. Svitolina, who is from Ukraine and like Wozniacki had a child last year, tried to remain fit through her pregnancy. Then she spent three months after childbirth reworking her game with a new coach, Raemon Sluiter.She played a series of smaller tournaments in the spring as she prepared for top-level tennis and set few expectations for immediate success, especially given how much energy she was spending raising money for relief efforts in Ukraine. In June, Svitolina made the quarterfinals of the French Open and in July she made the semifinals of Wimbledon. She and her husband, Gael Monfils, have left their daughter at home in Europe.“Pretty cool that I get to live my passion and be a mom and kind of wear many hats,” Wozniacki said Friday after advancing to the round of 16.Robert Deutsch/USA Today Sports Via Reuters ConWozniacki, on the other hand, took the go-big-or-go-home approach, beginning her comeback at the two big U.S. Open tuneup tournaments in Montreal and outside Cincinnati, then playing the year’s final Grand Slam with just three post-comeback matches. She wrote in Vogue that she believed she could win the U.S. Open.Ultimately, most of the best tennis players come to understand that they are not simply athletes but also performers and entertainers. Once they make that leap, they begin to draw energy not just from the act of competing but also the feedback loop experienced by doing the thing they have done from the time they were very small, to the exclusion of nearly any other pursuit, in front of thousands of people.It becomes a kind of drug, and the fix isn’t available from simply playing a few friendly sets in a quiet park. Anyone can do that.“I love playing in front of a big crowd,” Wozniacki said Friday. “I love playing on the big stadiums. That’s exciting to me. That’s why I’m still playing. It’s a great feeling.” More

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      How the War in Ukraine Turned Tennis Into a Battlefield

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      It was a few days before the start of Wimbledon this summer, and Elina Svitolina, just off a flight from Geneva, had come to the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club to check in for the tournament. She was returning after a year’s absence. “It feels like it has been 10 years,” she said as she got out of the car. A lot had happened since she last competed at Wimbledon, in 2021. She had given birth to a daughter named Skaï, the first child for her and her husband, the French player Gaël Monfils. Also, her country, Ukraine, had been invaded by Russia.Listen to This ArticleFor more audio journalism and storytelling, More

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      Elina Svitolina’s Love Affair With Wimbledon Ends, but U.S. Open Awaits

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      Svitolina, the Ukrainian star who captured hearts in London and beyond, lost to Marketa Vondrousova on Thursday but will play on through the summer.One fan in Centre Court held the Ukrainian flag. Another yelled, “We love you, Elina.” The Ukrainian ambassador was there, too, cheering along with fans from Britain, the United States, Uganda, Bulgaria and more, for Elina Svitolina, the uncrowned sentimental champion of Wimbledon 2023.But in the end, the pressure of carrying the hopes of both her own nation and Wimbledon Nation wore her down. Despite the attempts of the crowd to bolster her spirit, Svitolina was unable to overcome Marketa Vondrousova, the 42nd-ranked player in the world, who beat her in straight sets on Thursday, leaving a palpable void in the tournament.“It’s a lot of responsibility, a lot of tension,” Svitolina conceded after the match. “I try to balance it as much as I can. But, yeah, sometimes it gets maybe too much.”Svitolina, who has been a flag-bearer both for Ukraine and for new mothers around the world, planned to depart Britain on Friday to reunite with her daughter and family. But revitalized by her triumph at Wimbledon, she will carry on through the summer and onward, drawing even more attention to her twin causes.“What she is doing is beautiful in so many ways,” said Phuma Yeni, a social care worker from London. “Everyone is rooting for her because she is so courageous.”Despite the attempts of the crowd to bolster her spirit, Svitolina was unable to overcome Marketa Vondrousova.During her semifinal loss, fans atop Henman Hill, the mound next to Court 1 where fans gather to watch matches on a giant video screen, fell almost silent. They cheered and clapped when Svitolina did well, but it became clear early on that she was in a desperate fight, and a sullen cloud of gloom descended over the grand tennis campus.“It’s very sad,” said Valia Ivanova, a civil servant and tennis fan from London, by way of Bulgaria, who normally supports Novak Djokovic. “She has such a beautiful story, and everyone wanted her to win. Now, you can hear, it is just silent.”Svitolina has become a beacon for many people in her country and beyond for her outspoken support of Ukraine’s efforts to fight against the Russian invasion. She has used her celebrity, organizing tennis events and other activities to raise money for relief efforts, and has made public declarations decrying the invasion. She also drew attention to the cause by refusing to shake hands — as is customary after each match — with players from Russia and Belarus. The latter country provided support for the invasion.Svitolina said she had felt the support from the fans throughout her six matches here, and she thanked the tennis fans who had come to watch her in person and the millions more watching on television from her homeland and around the world. She specifically thanked the British people and government for their staunch support of Ukraine since the 2022 invasion, in providing both military assistance and sanctuary for refugees.“I’m really thankful for the crowd to support me, be there for me, and all Ukrainian people as well,” Svitolina said. “They support us quite a lot in different kind of ways, for a lot of Ukrainians who arrived here when the war started. Really thankful for all the people to support us in different levels.”Wimbledon, which barred Russian and Belarusian players from participating last year, relented this year and allowed them to play, but it does not recognize the countries they represent. Vadym Prystaiko, Ukraine’s ambassador, watched Svitolina play from the Royal Box on Thursday, and she was not even aware of it until her postmatch news conference.“I’m really thankful for the crowd to support me, be there for me, and all Ukrainian people as well,” Svitolina said. Since the beginning of the tournament, the All England Club has provided tickets, transportation and food to over 1,000 Ukrainian refugees. The club would most likely have done so even if Svitolina had not been rampaging to a semifinal, but her success shone more light on the circumstances.“She is the story of the tournament,” said Sarah Sserwanga, a tennis fan from London who watched the match with her daughter, Zoe. “Everything she is doing has been so inspiring.”Many fans have also been inspired by Svitolina’s ability to play so well as a new mother. In October, she gave birth to a girl, Skai, and she returned to the tennis tour in April. Her husband, the professional tennis player Gaël Monfils, has been at home with the baby, along with both of the couple’s mothers. Svitolina has worked mostly alone here to charm and captivate the fans.Sserwanga, an executive, has two children, and was able to take six months off to care for them after each were born. Then it was back to work. She tried to imagine the challenges Svitolina had faced in coming back so soon and leaving her baby behind during her extended run here.“Your body can change, your emotions swirl, and you don’t know what is coming next sometimes,” Sserwanga said. “To have all that, plus playing for your country as she is, it is amazing. Simply amazing.”For the next several weeks, on hardcourts across North America, leading up to the U.S. Open, Svitolina will try to build on her success and perhaps convert it into her first final at a Grand Slam event.Before that, she was looking forward to the one thing she knew would cheer her up: seeing her daughter again. As tears welled in her eyes during her painful postmatch news conference, a smile broke through.“That will be the best part,” she said. More

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      Marketa Vondrousova Ends Elina Svitolina’s Wimbledon Run

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      Vondrousova beat Svitolina, the Ukrainian tennis star who had won the hearts of fans, in straight sets to advance to the women’s singles final.Elina Svitolina’s storybook run at Wimbledon came to an agonizing end on Thursday as she lost her semifinal match against Marketa Vondrousova of the Czech Republic in straight sets.Svitolina, a new mother from Ukraine who has become a symbol of defiance since the Russian invasion in February 2022 — especially so during her runs at the French Open and Wimbledon — fell to Vondrousova, 6-3, 6-3, on an error-filled afternoon under the roof on Centre Court.For 10 days, Svitolina, who needed a wild card to get into the tournament, had played tennis with a combination of freedom and defiance that thrilled the British crowd, especially during her win over 19th-seeded Victoria Azarenka of Belarus in the fourth round, when she prevailed in a final set tiebreaker after Azarenka appeared to have the match all but won. Two days later, Svitolina toppled Iga Swiatek of Poland, the world No. 1 and four-time Grand Slam champion, in another tense and emotional three-set triumph.She spoke of how the war and being a new mother had changed her and her approach to tennis, even making her better because she had a new perspective on the sport.“I don’t take difficult situations as like a disaster,” she said. “There are worse things in life. I’m just more calmer.”But then she ran into Vondrousova, a talented and tricky left-handed player who may not have anything close to the résumé of Swiatek and Azarenka — or Sofia Kenin or Venus Williams, two of Svitolina’s other victims at this tournament — but she played as if she did.Vondrousova, who was a ranked No. 1 in the world as a junior and reached the French Open final in 2019, is developing a habit of playing the spoiler. At the Tokyo Olympics, she eliminated Naomi Osaka of Japan, the national hero and international star who had lit the Olympic torch at the opening ceremony, and went on to win a silver medal.Against Svitolina, she displayed every bit of the skill that she has shown in her best matches, showing off a varied attack that includes rolling forehands, drop shots and a penchant for going to the net to finish points at every opportunity. Being left-handed also helps. It forces opponents to adjust to different spins than they normally face and to switch the direction of their attack if they want to get the ball onto her backhand.She had plenty of help from Svitolina, who during the first hour of the match looked as if she had lost the ethereal feel for the ball that had characterized her play throughout so much of the tournament. Swiatek has spoken about how this version of Svitolina, who spent so much of her maternity leave raising money for war relief in Ukraine, was so different.“She played with more freedom and more guts,” Swiatek said. “Sometimes she really just let go of her hand and she played really, really fast.”That version of Svitolina appeared only briefly. In the second set, down a set and 4-0, she broke Vondrousova’s serve twice to gain a chance to even the set.The crowd, which had wanted so badly to help swing the match in her favor, came alive as Svitolina let out a scream and a fist pump and skipped toward her chair for the changeover. But as soon as she seized the momentum, she gave it right back. More

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      Elina Svitolina Aims for a Wimbledon Singles Final Against Jabeur or Sabalenka

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      Svitolina, the Ukrainian player who has captivated Wimbledon fans, beat No. 1 Iga Swiatek and will play Marketa Vondrousova in a semifinal match Thursday.Ons Jabeur still cannot bring herself to watch last year’s Wimbledon final. Her loss to Elena Rybakina on Centre Court is still too raw, too depressing to offset any tactical value that Jabeur might squeeze out of relieving it all over again.But, she said with a smile, “I can watch today’s match.”Indeed, that will make great binge viewing for Jabeur, who was able to exact a measure of revenge from the third-seeded Rybakina, 6-7 (5), 6-4, 6-1, in a quarterfinal on Centre Court Wednesday.She received no trophy for it, but it set up another Wimbledon rematch — this one against No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka, who beat Jabeur in the quarterfinal stage two years ago in straight sets. But much has changed since then, for both women.On the other side of the draw, Elina Svitolina, a wild-card entrant, will play the unseeded, but highly talented, Marketa Vondrousova for the other chance at the final.Svitolina and Jabeur are the clear audience favorites at Wimbledon. Jabeur, who is from Tunisia, is adored for her warm, engaging personality and for her trailblazing efforts as the first woman from Africa and the first from an Arabic-speaking country to reach a Grand Slam tournament final. She also reached the U.S. Open final later last summer.Svitolina, who beat No. 1 Iga Swiatek in their quarterfinal on Tuesday, has captivated fans around the world for her unflagging efforts to support and play on behalf of her native Ukraine. She also had a baby in October. Even Svitolina’s opponents cannot suppress their admiration for the outspoken Svitolina, who only returned to the tour in April, but has slashed her way through the draw to reach the final four.“She’s a superwoman,” Vondrousova said.Jabeur and Sabalenka together represent the power side of the draw, where, by chance, most of the better grass court players were assembled after the drawing. Rybakina, last year’s champion, said she thought the winner of Thursday’s duel between Sabalenka and Jabeur would eventually take home the trophy, and many would agree. Jabeur, in a moment of candid self-confidence, revealed she was one of them.Aryna Sabalenka defeated Madison Keys in a quarterfinal on Wednesday.Glyn Kirk/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“I do believe our part is stronger than the other part,” Jabeur said. “But every Grand Slam final is a final, and you can change a lot of things.”It was hardly an affront to Svitolina and Vondrousova, but sometimes players seize upon the most innocuous slights to fuel an angry motivation. Jo Durie, the British former player and now a coach and broadcaster, said that in 1983, at the peak of Martina Navratilova’s power, she had once dared to declare publicly that she had a chance to beat the great champion.Durie made the comment when their Australian Open quarterfinal had been suspended by rain at one set apiece.“Martina was livid,” Durie recalled on Wednesday. “The next day she said to the press, ‘How dare Jo-Jo say that?’ We all have an ego in this sport, and we all have to use it at some point.”Durie said her words had been slightly distorted in news reports the following day. But sometimes the smallest things can be used to seek an advantage, and by Saturday’s final, Svitolina or Vondrousova may seek to uphold the honor of her side of the draw, should she play Jabeur.As popular as Svitolina has become, Durie warned that Vondrousova, the least known player still alive in the draw, could not be overlooked.After Vondrousova became a French Open finalist in 2019, her career was subsequently affected by injuries. But as a well-rounded left-handed player, she can befuddle opponents with her serve and a variety of shots, from soft and dicey to overpowering.“Wow, is she talented,” Durie said.Could this then be the stage where Svitolina’s captivating run comes to an end? Or, if she wins, will she end up facing Sabalenka, a powerful Belarusian player whose nationality makes her an enemy of sorts to Svitolina?Since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 with Belarus’s logistical support, Svitolina has helped raise money for relief efforts in Ukraine and has declared that every match she plays is on behalf of her country. She has also said she will not shake hands with any players from Russia or Belarus, even if she likes them personally.Elina Svitolina reached a semifinal by upsetting No. 1 Iga Swiatek.Sebastien Bozon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe matter surfaced in the fourth round when Svitolina defeated Victoria Azarenka, who is from Belarus. Azarenka and Svitolina are compatible personally, and Azarenka spoke out against the invasion when it began. Even though there was no handshake after that match, Azarenka gave Svitolina a thumbs-up salute. But fans booed Azarenka off the court — and it stunned her. Some seemingly booed because they misunderstood, blaming Azarenka for the snub. Others perhaps did so because of Azarenka’s nationality.“I think people also need to know what’s going on and why there is no handshake between Ukrainians, Russian and Belarusian players,” Sabalenka said after she had beaten Madison Keys, 6-2, 6-4, on Wednesday. “I really hope that nobody else will face this reaction from the crowd.”More pressing, of course, is her meeting with Jabeur in their power semifinal. Sabalenka understands that Jabeur, while known for her slices, her drop shots and her off-speed game, can also unload from the baseline when necessary. Sabalenka called Jabeur’s game “tricky” and noted that her opponent’s goal, to become the first Arab and African woman to win a Grand Slam event, was providing her with enhanced motivation.But Jabeur has other forces driving her, too, similar to what spurred her on Wednesday against Rybakina. Jabeur did not watch their encounter from last year, but walking onto the court felt eerily similar. So to shake things up, she took the chair on the other side from the one she had sat in last year.In a similar way, she is now out to erase her quarterfinal loss to Sabalenka here in 2021.“I’m going to prepare and take my revenge from two years ago,” Jabeur said, again with a smile. More

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      Elina Svitolina Of Ukraine One Match Away From Wimbledon Final

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      Svitolina, a new mother who has said she is playing to give strength to her people back home in Ukraine, is one match away from an improbable and inspiring spot in the Wimbledon final.It is time to consider whether having a child, and spending a year away from the sport to raise money to help her compatriots back home in Ukraine, have made Elina Svitolina an even better tennis player.She says they have, and there is no reason not to believe her.Svitolina’s improbable run at Wimbledon rolled on in grand fashion on Tuesday. Two days after Svitolina, a new mother who needed a wild card to get into the tournament, beat the former world No. 1 Victoria Azarenka of Belarus in an emotional and dramatic triumph, Svitolina beat the current world No. 1, Iga Swiatek.Svitolina, playing with pluck, steeliness and a higher purpose, matched the hard-hitting Swiatek shot for shot, and then some, on the most hallowed court in the sport, sending joy through a crowd that had been with her since her first shot of a tournament that she had thought would be over for her by now.When the match was over, Svitolina put a hand over her face, hugged Swiatek from across the net and then raised two arms to the crowd in a shrug of disbelief.“I don’t know what is happening right now,” Svitolina told them moments later.Some things are hard to explain.Shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine 18 months ago, Svitolina announced that she was taking a break from professional tennis because she was pregnant with her first child with her husband, Gaël Monfils, the veteran tour pro and tennis showman from France.Tennis was barely a priority then anyway. Her pregnancy was at the top of the list, and so was raising money for war relief efforts in her homeland. Her foundation has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars since the start of the war.In October, she and Monfils announced the birth of their daughter, Skai. Not long afterward, Svitolina began training and practicing for her return to the WTA Tour, in March at the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells.Svitolina, right, beat the current world No. 1, Iga Swiatek, at Wimbledon on Tuesday.Julian Finney/Getty ImagesIt didn’t go well at first, as she lost six of her first seven matches, but Svitolina — a graceful and deceptively powerful player who had been ranked as high as third in the world as recently as 2019 — slowly started to regain her feel for the ball and for the competition.And she made it clear, especially during the French Open in Paris, that tennis was no longer about money or ranking points. It was about trying to bring some joy to the people of Ukraine.She did plenty of that as she surged into the quarterfinals at Wimbledon. Still, she had made it past the second round there just twice in eight tries and had not competed on grass since 2021 until last month. Her hopes were so low that she bought tickets to a Harry Styles concert last week, assuming she would be free.She wasn’t, and after her win over Swiatek on Tuesday, she said she did not think she was going to take the pop star up on his offer to invite her to a concert anytime soon.“It was very sweet from him,” she said of Styles’s offer. “Hopefully one day I can go.”It will have to wait at least until after her semifinal match on Thursday against Marketa Vondrousova of the Czech Republic, who beat Jessica Pegula of the United States in three sets. A win over Vondrousova might very well set up a showdown in the finals with a player from Belarus (Aryna Sabalenka) or with Elena Rybakina, the defending champion, who grew up in Russia but represents Kazakhstan. Sabalenka and Rybakina play their quarterfinal matches Wednesday and are heavy favorites.That is down the road, though, and would surely bring tension similar to that in Svitolina’s fourth-round win over Azarenka. Players from Russia and Belarus were prohibited from playing in the tournament last year, and while they have been mostly warmly received, Svitolina and the other players from Ukraine have refused to shake hands with players from those countries.Azarenka was booed off the court — unfairly so, Svitolina said — after Svitolina had beaten her Sunday, even though Azarenka gave Svitolina a thumbs-up after the final point. Last year, Azarenka offered to play in a charity fund-raiser to benefit war relief efforts, though players from Ukraine told her not to. But the boos still rained down.Svitolina announced that she was taking a break from professional tennis in 2022 because she was pregnant with her first child with her husband, Gaël Monfils.Pool photo by Daniel ColeSwiatek, who is from Poland and is a staunch critic of the invasion, has done more than any player not from Ukraine to help war relief efforts.But there was no shortage of healthy tension in Tuesday’s match. Swiatek, a four-time Grand Slam tournament champion, appeared to be in control early and even served for the first set at 5-4. She then missed on a series of tentative and wild forehands and first serves. Svitolina kept making her shots on tight wires, clearing the net by mere inches, time and again for the rest of the afternoon.She won 16 of the final 18 points in the first set. As the roof closed with rain on the way, a panicked Swiatek headed to the corner of the court, begging her team for answers.“I felt like I’m making pretty much the same mistakes,” Swiatek said. “I wanted some tip, what they think I should actually focus on. Sometimes when something is not working, it’s hard to find a reason because there are maybe a few reasons.”The biggest reason of all was Svitolina, who said later that she had been playing with a different sort of inspiration. She had spent parts of the last two days watching videos of her child in Ukraine watching her matches on a phone. She knows what her victories mean and where they fit in the grand scheme of things.All of that has a power.“War made me stronger and also made me mentally stronger,” she said. “I don’t take difficult situations as like a disaster, you know? There are worse things in life. I’m just more calmer.”Have no doubt: She desperately wants to win, but her experience of the pressure has changed.“I look at the things a bit differently,” she said.After she walked off the court, she placed a call over FaceTime to Monfils, who — along with her mother and his — is taking care of their daughter at one of their homes. She said Skai hadn’t talked to her much. She was distracted by a serving of ice cream.Can she win this tournament and the biggest prize of all?She insisted, as she had after the Azarenka match, that she wasn’t meant to go this far. She isn’t letting her husband come, because he has not been here yet, and she is not messing with her routine now. Who needs him anyway, when she has another purpose and another power, especially against those opponents from Russia and Belarus?“Each time I play against them, it’s big motivation, big responsibility,” she said. “Right now it’s very, very far. It seems very close, but it’s very far from this.” More

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      After a Fall, Venus Williams Is Eliminated on Wimbledon’s First Day

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      Williams, a five-time Wimbledon singles champion, was vying, at 43, to become one of the oldest women to win a main draw singles match at the sport’s oldest Grand Slam event.She walked onto the court late on a gray and chilly afternoon with that rocking gait that has become so familiar to tennis fans over the past 25 years. With her tennis bag on her shoulder, she pulled at the ends of an elastic band to get in some last-minute upper-body stretches.Venus Williams, a five-time Wimbledon singles champion and a nine-time finalist, was back on Centre Court on Monday at age 43, vying to become one of the oldest women to win a main draw singles match at the sport’s oldest Grand Slam event.That is not how the day went. It ultimately left her limping, an injured symbol of a couple of undeniable truths about this era of tennis.The first: More players are stretching their careers longer than they ever have, into their late 30s and, in the case of the Williams sisters, into their early 40s, thanks to better training, nutrition and compensation. Caroline Wozniacki, 32, a former world No. 1, announced last month that she was returning to tennis after retiring in 2020 and having two children.The second: It’s difficult to stay healthy and win in this brutal sport in your late 30s and early 40s, unless your name is Novak Djokovic.There were members of the older set scattered all across the All England Club on Monday, the first day of Wimbledon, and not simply in the television booths. Williams took Centre Court after Djokovic, 36, had begun yet another title defense in his usual fashion, beating Pedro Cachín of Argentina in straight sets. The American player John Isner, 38, lost in four sets on Court 16 to Jaume Munar of Spain, but two courts over, on Court 18, Stan Wawrinka, another 38-year-old, was giving a clinic to Emil Ruusuvuori, eliminating the 24-year-old Finn in straight sets.Williams came up short in her effort, a hard-luck, 6-4, 6-3 loss to Elina Svitolina of Ukraine in which Williams aggravated an injured right knee early in the match. Williams never regained the form she had shown in the match’s first few minutes, when she grabbed an early lead and gave every sign that a win for the old guard might be in the cards. Last month, Williams, ranked 558th in the world, beat a player ranked in the top 50 for the first time in four years, outlasting Camila Giorgi of Italy in a third-set tiebreaker in Birmingham, England.The victory helped Williams earn a wild-card entry into the Wimbledon tournament, which she won in five of nine appearances from 2000 to 2008. She made the women’s singles final as recently as 2017, and she has not given any indication that she is pointing at a certain end.“I’m a competitor,” a somber and shaken Williams said in her postmatch news conference. “That’s what I do for a living.”She has been doing it since she was 14.Officials assisted Williams after she fell and clutched her right knee in the first set of the match.Zac Goodwin/Press Association, via Associated PressPlaying on grass that was slick from a midafternoon rain shower and the moisture that lingered in the air throughout the day, Williams came out firing serves and lacing hard, flat shots to the back of the court. She broke Svitolina’s serve in the second game. But facing break point in the third game, Williams charged the net and then crumpled onto the grass with a scream as she clutched her right knee, which was wrapped in a support band.Williams remained on the ground for several minutes, with Svitolina placing a towel under her head for support. It looked as though Williams’s afternoon would end right there. But she got up and limped to her chair, where a trainer examined her. Afterward, her movement was far more limited than it had been in the first two games.She hobbled through points and struggled to generate the power from her groundstrokes and her serve that has long been the signature of her game but requires the ability to push and torque with the lower half of her body. The speed of her first serve dropped from 115 miles per hour early in the match to the mid-90s.“I was literally killing it — then I got killed by the grass,” Williams said. “It’s not fun right now.”The sequence of events had an eerie familiarity. Two years ago, her sister Serena walked onto the same court for her first-round match, seeking her eighth Wimbledon title at age 39. The effort lasted just six games: Serena Williams had to withdraw in the first round because of an ankle injury.Serena Williams returned to Wimbledon last year at the start of what seems to have been a final summer of professional tennis, though one never knows these days. She lost in the first round in three sets on an evening that had the feel of a farewell.What was striking about her older sister’s match Monday was how little it felt like a valedictory, and how defiant Venus Williams seemed as she faced the toll that aging exacts on every athlete, regardless of her ability.She said she was in shock at being injured, though older athletes are far more injury-prone.“I just can’t believe this happened,” she said. “It’s, like, bizarre.”She was angry at how the match had ended. On match point, Svitolina hit a ball that was called out, but the chair umpire gave her the match when the Hawk-Eye system showed it was in. Williams’s return of the shot had been wide, and the umpire ruled that the point would not be replayed. Williams skipped the postmatch handshake with the umpire.She said the injury had been so painful that it had prevented her from focusing. She said that she had never considered stopping and that she would have her knee checked on Tuesday. Moments later, she was talking about the difficulty of processing another injury after recovering from a hamstring injury at the start of the year.She has been missing from the tour for a while. It is not what she wants for herself in her early 40s.“Hopefully I can just figure out what’s happening with me and move forward,” she said.For nearly 30 years, that has meant one thing: back to the tennis court. More

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      Tension Overshadows the Tennis Between Sabalenka and Svitolina

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      Players from Ukraine do not shake hands with players from Russia and Belarus. Aryna Sabalenka waited at the net anyway.In hindsight, this French Open was probably destined to come down to a moment like the one that unfolded Tuesday.For 10 days in Paris, and for months on the women’s professional tennis tour, Ukrainian players have made it clear that they will not shake hands with players from Russia or Belarus after their matches. Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus, the second seed and one of the favorites to win the women’s singles championship, knows this as well as anyone. She beat Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk last week in the first round and then watched Kostyuk gather her belongs and leave the court quickly under a chorus of boos.Regardless of the hostility from the crowd, there was zero chance that Elina Svitolina, the unofficial leader of the female players from Ukraine, would behave any differently when it was her turn to face Sabalenka on Tuesday. Sabalenka dispatched Svitolina, 6-4, 6-4, with one last bullying rally and a final blasted forehand.And so, Svitolina said, as she saw Sabalenka at the net, waiting — and waiting, and waiting — and staring at her when the match was over, one thought passed through her mind: “What are you doing?”Svitolina thought Sabalenka’s move was intentional. Sabalenka said it was just instinctive.Clive Brunskill/Getty ImagesDid Svitolina think Sabalenka was taking advantage of the moment, knowing that the crowd at Roland Garros had previously howled at players who forsook the postmatch handshake?“Yes, I think so, unfortunately,” Svitolina said during a news conference after the match.Sabalenka later denied that she had done anything of the sort.“It just was an instinct,” she said, because that is what she always does at the end of a match.That Sabalenka was saying anything at all was news in itself. After her third-round win on Friday, Sabalenka skipped the mandatory postmatch news conference, opting instead to do an interview only with a WTA employee. She did the same thing after her fourth-round win.The tennis has often been overshadowed by geopolitics at this French Open. Novak Djokovic, the 22-time Grand Slam champion and Serbia’s biggest celebrity, proclaimed his solidarity with ethnic Serbian protesters who clashed with NATO forces in Kosovo late last month over control of the region and the status of the country, which more than 100 nations have recognized but Serbia and Russia have not. Djokovic even scrawled on a plastic plate in front of a television camera that Kosovo was the heart of Serbia, a statement that supporters of Kosovo called fascist and supportive of a philosophy that had led to ethnic cleansing.For Sabalenka, talk of politics became unavoidable after she drew Kostyuk, the rising Ukrainian, in the first round, and a journalist from Ukraine asked about her previous statements that she would end the war if she could. The journalist also raised Sabalenka’s close association in the past with President Aleksandr G. Lukashenko of Belarus, who has allowed Russia to use his country as a staging area for its war in Ukraine. The internet has no shortage of photos and videos of Sabalenka with Lukashenko after he had arrested political opponents and used the military and the police to quash protests.After those news conferences, Sabalenka announced that she no longer felt “safe” facing the news media and opted to speak only with a WTA employee following her next two matches. The WTA and tournament organizers supported her decision, waiving the fines and threats of more serious penalties they had imposed on Naomi Osaka for doing the same thing at the French Open two years ago.“I felt really disrespected,” Sabalenka said Tuesday of those first two tense news conferences.While Sabalenka was struggling off the court, Svitolina was becoming the story of the tournament. She had spent most of the past year on maternity leave and raising money for relief efforts in Ukraine, and she thrilled crowds as she battled through her first four matches in her first Grand Slam following the birth of her daughter. The local fans have a special affinity for Svitolina, who is married to the French tennis player Gaël Monfils, who was courtside at all of her matches.Svitolina won her first four matches at the French Open, in her first Grand Slam since the birth of her daughter.Clive Brunskill/Getty ImagesHer victories set up the showdown with Sabalenka, which immediately felt like so much more than a match between two tennis players.This was Ukraine against Belarus, a well-loved player in the sport against a 25-year-old whom fans are still getting to know. One had become a leading figure in popular culture in war relief efforts; the other had not made it clear where her loyalties lied.Under pressure from the Ukrainian journalist, Sabalenka had said she did not support the war — “Nobody normal will ever support this war,” she said — but had not renounced her support of Lukashenko.Tennis-wise, it was a duel between a grinding retriever, Svitolina, and perhaps the women’s game’s biggest hitter, Sabalenka, and it quickly became clear that unless Sabalenka’s old erratic self emerged, this was not going to be Svitolina’s day. Sabalenka stayed steady, and Svitolina was out. Sabalenka will face Karolina Muchova of the Czech Republic in the semifinals Thursday.Then came the awkward standoff at the end, and even some boos for Svitolina’s actions as she packed her bag, with Sabalenka waiting at the net, and as she left the court.“She didn’t deserve all this,” Sabalenka said of the howls.“I don’t want to be involved in any politics,” Sabalenka said at a news conference after the match. “I just want to be a tennis player.”Lisi Niesner/ReutersSvitolina said everyone might be better off if the WTA and tournament organizers made it clear to players from Russia and Belarus that as long as there was war, there would not be any handshaking. She also said one player should not get the advantage of taking a pass on the potential stress of facing the news media while everyone else had to sit in front of microphone and respond to whatever questions arise.“I faced difficulties,” Svitolina said. “I’m not escaping. I have my strong position, and I’m vocal about that.” She said she would not try to curry favor with the public “by betraying my strong belief and strongest position for my country.”When it was Sabalenka’s turn, she once more stated her opposition to the war, and when pressed — by a journalist from Poland — she attempted to add slight distance between her and Lukashenko. The Ukrainian journalist who had questioned her previously is not covering the second week of the tournament.“I don’t support war, meaning I don’t support Lukashenko right now,” Sabalenka said.She spoke of losing sleep over her decision to skip the previous news conferences and said that she had felt bad about it and that she planned not to skip any more but did not regret the decision.“I don’t want to be involved in any politics,” she said. “I just want to be a tennis player.”For the time being, and with a possible finals date coming with Iga Swiatek of Poland, who wears a pin of Ukraine’s flag when she plays, that may not be possible. More

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      French Open: Ukraine’s Kostyuk Booed After No Handshake With Belarusian Sabalenka

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      Marta Kostyuk of Ukraine had the crowd on her side initially, but then was booed after she did not shake hands with Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus after losing to her in straight sets.The moment the women’s singles draw for the French Open pitted Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus against Marta Kostyuk of Ukraine in the opening round, there was no doubt the start of the tournament would produce some fireworks.It did that and more.The score line showed a decisive 6-3, 6-2 win for Sabalenka, the reigning Australian Open champion, who is the second seed in Paris and one of the hottest players in the world.But what did not show up in the score line was the behavior of the morning crowd at Roland Garros’ main court, Philippe Chatrier. Spectators urged on Kostyuk at the beginning of the match, then rained boos on her when she left the court without shaking hands with Sabalenka. Kostyuk has refused to shake the hand of any player from Russia or Belarus.And then there was Sabalenka, who on Sunday came as close as she ever has to condemning the Russian invasion, in a rare statement of defiance by an athlete from Belarus or Russia.“Nobody in this world, Russian athletes or Belarusian athletes, support the war. Nobody,” Sabalenka said at a news conference after her win. “How can we support the war? Nobody, normal people, will never support it.“This is like one plus one, it’s two,” she continued, saying if she could stop the war she would. “Unfortunately, it’s not in our hands.”But shortly afterward, Kostyuk dismissed Sabalenka’s sentiments as empty words.“I feel like you should ask these players who would they want to win the war, because if you ask this question, I’m not so sure these people will say that they want Ukraine,” Kostyuk said.She added that Sabalenka should speak for herself and not for other players from Russia and Belarus.“I personally know athletes from tennis that support the war,” she said without identifying any.After Sabalenka said nobody supports the war in Ukraine, Kostyuk, above, said the question should be, “who would they want to win the war?”Pete Kiehart for The New York TimesThe impact of the war in Ukraine on tennis has been constant and never-ending. Fifteen months after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the war shows no end in sight. (Belarus has provided a staging ground for Russian soldiers, and its leader has said the country would join the war if attacked.)Belarus and Russia have been banned from team tennis competitions, and their flags and country names have been banished from the sport. The moves have left players from Ukraine unsatisfied and players from Russia and Belarus feeling like pariahs.The tension on Sunday was in stark contrast to the otherwise celebratory feel of the first day of the French Open. It is often one of the most joyous days in tennis, especially with the sky sparkling with that special shade of bright Parisian blue. There is no red like the red of the clay courts of Roland Garros, no crowd that looks as effortlessly elegant as this one: the Panama hats, the silk spring dresses, the aperol spritzes in fancy glasses in seemingly every other hand.The absence of the injured star Rafael Nadal, whose record 14 men’s singles titles have made him synonymous with this event, is weirding everyone out. But as Nadal has said, tennis moves fast and waits for no one. The rousing roars whenever a French player was in action echoed across the grounds as loudly as they ever have. As Kostyuk and Sabalenka made clear, though, the war may very well make this tournament and tennis summer unlike any before it. On Monday, Elina Svitolina, among the most successful players Ukraine has produced, will make her Grand Slam return from maternity leave, against Martina Trevisan of Italy. Anhelina Kalinina of Ukraine, whose grandparents had to leave their home and whose parents’ home was bombed, will play Diane Parry of France on Tuesday in her first match after her emotional run to the Italian Open final this month.“Everyone is in a very different situation,” Kostyuk said in an interview Sunday. “Whoever needs a comfort, I’m always there. We have a very good group.”Kostyuk, though, was the one who seemed to need some comforting Sunday in the moments after her match. On the final point, she walked to shake hands with the chair umpire and then directly to her courtside seat. Sabalenka shook hands with the chair umpire, too, then stood for a moment watching Kostyuk gather her belongings as the restless noise from the crowd began to rise.Sabalenka said she initially thought the boos were for her but then realized they were for Kostyuk.Pete Kiehart for The New York TimesSabalenka said she initially thought the boos were for her, but then realized they were for Kostyuk, undeservedly so, she added, explaining that she understands why the Ukrainian players do not want to be seen shaking hands with a Belarusian or a Russian.Kostyuk said she was shaken by the reaction, which was so different from a supportive reception in the United States this year when she refused to shake the hand of a Russian opponent.“I want to see people react to it in 10 years when the war is over,” she said. “I think they will not feel really nice about what they did.”Kostyuk last visited Ukraine in March to see her father and grandfather. She traveled there after the Miami Open. The journey required four flights to get to Poland by way of her temporary home in Monte Carlo, a two-and-a-half-hour train ride to the border, and then a six-hour car ride. She spent five days there, struggling to sleep amid the distant sounds of bomb-carrying drones that her relatives have somehow learned to live with. She said she still has not recovered from the trip.She woke up at 5 a.m. Sunday and saw a series of alerts on her phone about the latest drone attack on Kyiv, the largest of the war. She said she tried not to look at her phone in the overnight hours, but when she saw all the alerts she could not stop the urge to see what had happened.A few hours later, she was at Roland Garros preparing for her match with Sabalenka. To her surprise, she said, for the first time since the start of the war ahead of a match against a Russian or Belarusian, she was not focused on the nationality of her opponent. It was refreshing, she said, and it made her think that a day would come when a war would no longer intrude on her chosen occupation, that every tennis match would be nothing more and nothing less than that.One day perhaps, but certainly not Sunday. More