It seems Wimbledon organizers, through the tournament’s code of conduct, want to force Russian tennis players to publicly abandon their homeland, a State Duma deputy told . Svetlana Zhurova .
According to the Daily Mail, Russian tennis players will only be allowed at Wimbledon after signing a special code of conduct. The document is being finalized, but it is expected that Russian tennis players will be required during the tournament to refuse any overt show of support for their country, as well as to carry a flag or leave positive comments about the Federation of Russia.
In case of violation of the code, sanctions can be applied to Russians, up to and including expulsion.
“First of all, we still haven’t seen this code. Secondly, we don’t know how the international federations will react to this. Nevertheless, while it is a Wimbledon initiative, as far as I know. Therefore, while we don’t know what the document will look like and if it will look like at all.
Such things are in accordance with international federations. While the WTA and ATP insisted on admitting the Russians, Wimbledon was fined. So they are now trying to get out. How do you explain to them that that season they weren’t allowing athletes, but now they would be (allowed) under certain conditions?
On the one hand, our athletes and Belarusians performed without a flag for some time, but there was no need to sign anything. It does not happen every day without news. Now this code will be discussed. And again, in the current agenda, they will discuss with a negative connotation whether the athletes will sign it or not. Interestingly, when they previously performed without a flag, it didn’t seem to be considered unpatriotic: “Well, yes, forced circumstances.” And as soon as you sign a document, it sounds different.
This news played with completely different colors even in the West. Accordingly, the attitude towards athletes can be completely different if they sign something. Although it is clear that even at the Olympics our delegation signed such documents, when it was also impossible to get the flag, to mention our belonging to the country in social networks … But this is our delegation, the Russian Olympic Committee, they assumed the responsibility and the obligations, instructed the athletes. And it seems that we were all outraged, but met those conditions on the whole. At the time, they didn’t make as much news of it on a large scale, but now it’s the other way around.
What will our men do? I don’t want to predict. Since it is not clear if this will be accepted at all? But in general, it all seems strange, because it’s an absolutely politicized thing. And I think that’s unacceptable. You cannot give the impression that the athlete is being asked to give up his homeland. And they believe that in this way they force the athlete to do it and want to see it publicly. This is coming out. They are very fond of coming out to the UK and want to get such coming out from Russian athletes in relation to their own country. They do not accept otherwise, only such a form exists, unfortunately. It looks terrible,” Zhurova told .
The Russians and Belarusians have been suspended from the Wimbledon tournament in 2022 due to events in Ukraine. For this, the organizers of the competition were fined one million dollars, and the WTA and ATP deprived the tournament of ranking points.
Wimbledon 2023 will take place from July 3-16.
Source : MatchTV
I’m Rose Brown , a journalist and writer with over 10 years of experience in the news industry. I specialize in covering tennis-related news for Athletistic, a leading sports media website. My writing is highly regarded for its quick turnaround and accuracy, as well as my ability to tell compelling stories about the sport.
