Thunderbolt in the hushed world of Wimbledon.

The British Grand Slam tournament has decided to exclude Russian and Belarusian players from the 2022 edition of the big strawberry cream party.

The grass-court Major thus becomes the first tennis tournament to exclude these players individually due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

“In the circumstances of an unjustified and unprecedented military aggression, it would be unacceptable for the Russian regime to derive any benefit from the participation of Russian or Belarusian players,” the tournament organizers explained in a press release published on Wednesday April 20.

"We recognize that this decision is hard on those individually affected, and it is with sadness that they will suffer from the actions of the leaders of the Russian regime," added the chairman of the All England Club which hosts the event, Ian Hewitt.

Statement regarding Russian and Belarusian individuals at The Championships 2022.

— Wimbledon (@Wimbledon) April 20, 2022

Daniil Medvedev and Aryna Sabalenka absent

The ATP and WTA top 100 include 16 athletes concerned by the measure (four Russian players, one Belarusian, eight Russian players and three Belarusian players).

Among the women, the Belarusians Aryna Sabalenka (4th and semi-finalist in 2021) and Victoria Azarenka (18th) as well as the Russians Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (15th) and Daria Kasatkina (26th) will notably be missing.

Among the men, world No. 2 Daniil Medvedev and Andrei Rublev (8th) will not be able to defend their luck.

World No. 1 Serbian Novak Djokovic called the decision 'crazy', while saying he would 'always condemn war, being himself a child of war' after his first match at the Belgrade tournament.

Wimbledon organizers could reverse their decision if "circumstances change dramatically by June," the statement said. 

The male and female circuits opposed to the decision

The four Grand Slam tournaments – Australian Open, Roland-Garros, Wimbledon and US Open – are independent of the men's (ATP) and women's (WTA) circuits, where Russians and Belarusians are still allowed to participate in the tournaments, under a neutral banner. .

The two circuits have also criticized the decision taken by Wimbledon.

The ATP has called the exclusion 'unfair', especially as it extends to all grass-court tournaments this summer in Britain, including Queen's and Eastbourne, which are under the aegis of ATP.

The WTA also disapproves of the move by Wimbledon and the LTA to ban Russians and Belarusians from tournaments.

pic.twitter.com/PeTy0GTark

— Ben Rothenberg (@BenRothenberg) April 20, 2022

"Discrimination based on nationality is also a breach of our agreements with Wimbledon under which a player's participation is only based on his ranking. We will now analyze (...) the follow-up to be given to this decision “, underlined the ATP in a press release.

The WTA also said it was "very disappointed" with the announcement made by Wimbledon which it considers "neither fair nor justified", adding that it too would "evaluate the actions it can take" following this decision.

The delicate issue of athlete sanctions

Following the recommendations of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Russian and Belarusian athletes have been banned from numerous athletics and figure skating competitions as well as from the Paralympic Games in Beijing, the Football World Cup, the World Swimming Championships... tennis, tournaments in Russia and Belarus have been canceled and both nations have been excluded from team competitions (Davis Cup and Billie Jean King Cup, both won by Russia in 2021).

However, the consensus was that it seemed difficult to imagine sanctioning individuals, far from being open supporters of Kremlin policy.

Since the start of the conflict, the players concerned have been discreet in their condemnations, although the Russian Andrey Rublev wrote "No war please" on a television camera during a competition in Dubai just after the invasion.

"I want peace all over the world," said Daniil Medvedev, recovering from an operation.

The Belarusian Azarenka, former world No. 1 and crowned twice at the Australian Open, was more explicit.

“It is heartbreaking to see how many innocent people have been and continue to be affected by this violence,” the player said in March.

However, these declarations are deemed insufficient by Ukrainian players – including Elina Svitolina (ex-No. 5) – who on Wednesday asked the ATP and the WTA to exclude the Russians and Belarusians if they did not answer three correctly. questions set out in a press release: "Do you support the invasion (...), do you support military activities (...), do you support the Putin and Lukashenko regimes?".

The British government therefore asked the Wimbledon tournament to go further.

There was once a question of endorsing participation in an explicit and public condemnation of the war.

However, the solution could have put the athletes' families at risk.

"Once again, they are making athletes hostages of political prejudice, political intrigue (...) This is unacceptable," reacted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, even before the official announcement of Wimbledon.

Germans and Japanese excluded, not South Africans

Wimbledon has a history of banning athletes in retaliation for wars.

In the aftermath of World War II, the British Major had banished the Germans and the Japanese.

The English had not forgiven the bombing of the All England Lawn Tennis Club in 1940.

On the other hand, if they have sometimes been deprived of the Davis Cup or the Fed Cup (today the Billie Jean King Cup), South African tennis players have never been deprived of the grass tournament at the time of the apartheid.

The newspaper L'Équipe also recalls that Johan Kriek reached the quarter-finals twice under the colors of South Africa, in 1981 and 1982.

As for the remaining Grand Slam tournaments of the season, the US Open and Roland-Garros, we are kicking in touch for the moment.

The American Federation indicated that "at the moment, (it) has not made a decision regarding the participation of Russian and Belarusian players" in the 2022 edition of the American Major.

Same response from the side of the French Tennis Federation (FFT) as Roland-Garros begins on May 23.

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