After the All England club’s decision of banning all the Russian and Belarusian players from the Wimbledon, Italian Open now might also follow on this decision and are weighing their options in this favour too. The tournament which will be held from May 5-12 might not allow Russian and Belarusian players to play this time in Rome according to a report in rt.com on Saturday.
The best of players from all across the globe come to take part in the Italian Open played at the outdoor clay courts of Foro Italico. However, the report said that Italian authorities “are reportedly weighing up whether a ban should be imposed on Russian players” at the tournament.
The world famous and one of the most prestigious tournaments of the world, Wimbledon had issued the statement about the banning of Russian and Belarusian players from the tournament recently as well. The players who seem to be mainly affected by this decision will be men’s world No. 2 Russian Daniil Medvedev and women’s world No. 4 Belarusian player Aryna Sabalenka who are the highest-ranked players to not be taking part in this year’s tournament in England.
Ian Hewitt, Chairman of the All England Club, had said while announcing the decision that amidst the illegal and unjustified invasion by Russia, it would not be a good decision to allow the Russian regime to derive any benefits from the involvement of Russian or Belarusian players with ‘The Championships’.
On Saturday the report quoting Corriere della Sera in Italy, said that the local government “is considering whether it should follow the All England Club’s lead and ban Russian stars from featuring at the Italian Open in Rome too”.
The Italian news source said that the government along with their Prime Minister Mario Draghi have already made their mind about the decision and are only only being hindered by the thought of the ATP and the WTA back lash they would be receiving after their announcement of the decision.
This decision will however, be insignificant for Daniil Medvedev who won’t be able to take part in the tournament because of recovering from a small hernia surgery. World number 8 Andrey Rublev though, might not get to be a part of the tournament.
Rublev has said that Wimbledon’s decision to ban all Russian players is “complete discrimination”.
Serbian world No. 1, Novak Djokovic, while being against the war, also said that the ban on tennis players from Russia and Belarus was nothing but unacceptable.
“I will always condemn war. I will never support war being myself a child of war. I know how much emotional trauma it leaves. In Serbia we all know what happened in 1999. In the Balkans we have had many wars in recent history. However, I cannot support the decision of Wimbledon, I think it is crazy. When politics interferes with sport, the result is not good,” Djokovic said in Belgrade.
(Inputs from IANS)