‘Its Not United’ – Iga Swiatek Says ATP, WTA, and Other Tennis Bodies Are Not on the Same Page

Iga Swiatek has seen her stocks rise massively this season. The 20-year-old is in the form of her life, already winning five titles in 2022. She has dominated her opponents en route to her unbeaten run going into the ongoing French Open. Further, the Polish tennis star extended her winning streak to 29 matches after winning her first-round match. After her victory, she opened up about the controversy surrounding Wimbledon.

Iga Swiatek on the decision to strip Wimbledon of ranking points

Earlier this month, the tennis bodies decided to strip ranking points from Wimbledon after its ban on Russian and Belarusian athletes. During the post-match press conference after her first-round victory, Swiatek was asked to comment on this matter. She said, “Well, basically I feel like it’s a pretty tricky situation, and every solution is going to be somehow wrong one for some part of people or players.”

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Further, she added, “I feel like, yeah, it’s been a hard couple of weeks when we were also, you know, taking part of discussion. I felt like there is some responsibility on us in terms of that, but I feel like it shouldn’t be like that. Because the problem is I think the parties that are organizing the tournaments and WTA, ATP, ITF, they all have different opinions.”

Swiatek calls for a common standpoint

Talking about sports and politics, Swiatek said, “So for us, it’s a tricky one, honestly, because that’s — yeah, I mean, on one point, you know, that sport has always been used in politics. On the other, you want to, I don’t know, make the situation that it’s going to be equal for every player. But it’s a hard one.”

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Appealing the bodies to get united to tackle this situation, Swiatek said, “I just hope that the people that are responsible for making the decisions, they are all going to come together so our sport is going to be united, because for now, I feel like it’s not united. It’s all the people who are organizing tournaments. Like, for example, WTA, ATP, and ITF, they all have separate views and it’s not joint. We feel that in the locker room a little bit, so it’s pretty hard.”

Swiatek has started her French Open 2022 campaign on the front foot. She showed no signs of rustiness in her first-round victory over Lesia Tsurenko. She lost just two games in the match and took only 54 minutes to enter the next round. Up next, she’ll face Alison Riske in the second round.