Tennis should have banned Russian, Belarusian players: Iga Swiatek

LONDON – Tennis missed an opportunity to send a strong message to Moscow by failing to impose a blanket ban on players from Russia and its ally Belarus after the invasion of Ukraine, world No. 1 Iga Swiatek said.

Wimbledon banned players from the two countries after the war in February 2022 but said in March that it would now accept them as neutral athletes.

The 2022 tournament was the first time players were excluded from the championships on grounds of nationality since the immediate post-World War II era, when German and Japanese players were banned.

“After World War II, German players were not allowed, as well as Japanese and Italian (players), and I feel like this kind of thing would show the Russian government that maybe it’s not worth it,” Poland’s Swiatek told the BBC on Wednesday.

“We are just athletes, a little piece in the world, but sport is pretty important and sport has always been used for propaganda... Tennis, from the beginning, could do a bit better in showing everybody that tennis players are against the war.

“Tennis didn’t really go that way, but now it would be pretty unfair for Russian and Belarusian players to do that because this decision was supposed to be made a year ago.”

Russian and Belarusian players have been competing on the tours and at the other Grand Slams as neutral athletes. Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka, who won the Australian Open in January, has said she struggled to understand the “hate” in the locker room.

Swiatek described the locker room atmosphere as “pretty tense”.

“It’s not their fault they have a passport like that... their situation is pretty complicated and it’s hard for them to speak out loud about it,” the 21-year-old said.

Football has taken a tougher stance. Re-elected Uefa chief Aleksander Ceferin said on Wednesday it would be very hard to lift Russia’s suspension from the European governing body’s competitions until the war ended.

Both Uefa and world football’s governing body Fifa decided in February 2022 that all Russian teams – national or club sides – would be barred from their competitions following the invasion.

However, Uefa held off taking any decision to ban Belarus despite pressure from European Union lawmakers during its Ordinary Congress in Lisbon this week.

Highlighting the different approaches taken by the different sporting bodies, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said on Wednesday it would oppose a move by the Ukrainian government to strip its national sports governing bodies of their status if their athletes compete against Russians or Belarusians.

The Olympic body said such a plan raised “serious questions about the autonomy of Ukrainian sport”.

The IOC last week recommended allowing Russian and Belarusian athletes to compete as neutrals in international competitions.

It will make a decision on the participation of athletes from the two countries at the 2024 Olympics later, while Ukraine has threatened to boycott the Games if Russians are allowed to compete there. REUTERS, AFP