For three years, the United States was a haven for tennis players from Ukraine.
Then it came in the past two weeks. President Donald Trump and the best diplomats of Ukraine are pushing to abandon some of its mineral resources, in exchange for their continuous support in its war with Russia. Humanitarian assistance from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has been in danger since Trump directed Elon Musk, an involuntary “private government employee”, and the Ministry of Government Agency (DOGE), which was named after Mim on the Internet that includes a dog, to close the agency.
Days before the Indian Wales and Miami Open, the two largest tennis tournaments for this year on American soil outside the US Open, the tension week exploded in front of television cameras in the Oval Office. Friday, Trump Trump and Vice President GD Verse, President of Ukraine, Voludmir ZelinskiBecause of the lack of gratitude to support America. In an extraordinary break between two allies, Trump Zelinski was present for his weak position in negotiations and in war. “You don’t have the cards,” Trump said. “You either make a deal, or we are outside.”
Tennis players in Ukraine will now travel to the United States for the so -called “Sunshine Double” under a cloud, and a country has entered with a different type of government to those they have visited since Russia, with the help of Belarus, Ukraine invaded slightly more than three years ago.
“The United States helps us for a long time now,” To us SvetolinaThe Ukrainian player, the most decorated in men and women’s tennis, said in an interview from her home in Monaco last week. “Our government is working hard to find roads and decisions. They are trying everything and perhaps find other ways, other allies, or something. We only hope for the best.”
The United States gave Ukraine more assistance than any other country. The Ministry of Defense says it has spent more than 180 billion dollars (143 billion pounds) on the Atlantic solution, which is in response to Russia’s invasion. But for svitolina and its citizens, the following month will be one of the first 36 years in which they will have to think about what a country really thinks while standing on tennis courts.
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Svetolina: Ukraine’s uncontrollable spirit is a great motivation for me
Svitolina, 30, is one of four Ukrainians in the 100 best rounds in WTA (the best player for men is OKSANDR Ovchaningo, World No. 307.) Ukrainian higher is Marta Kostyuk, in No. 19; Svitolina is No. 24. Svitolina, Kostyuk, Dayana Yastremska (No. 44) Calinina (No. 52), the last weeks were especially difficult. Some of them pressed tennis leaders – a union with diamonds of professional tennis, ATP, and the International Tennis Federation (ITF) – to ban players from Russia and Belarus who showed Putin’s loyalty and Alexander Lukashenko, President of Blancus, from competing in their cards.
This has not happened since 2022, when the British tennis body prevented players from Russia and Belarus from playing in Wimbledon championships and other stadium championships in the United Kingdom, a little more than one month after the conquest of the four symbols, WTA, ATP and ITF, which condemns the invasion of Russia. The players, including Martina Navratilova, Novak Djokovic and Raphael Nadal, criticized the ban, and the Union of Professional Tennis players responded by stripping Wimbledon of the ranking points. The Tennis Association in the park canceled its ban for the year 2023.
ATP, WTA and four Grand Russians and Belarusians have allowed competing as neutral athletes; ITF excluded them from the international team competitions such as the Davis Cup (men) and the Billy Jean King Cup (women). They have not had plans to change these policies. The situation is still tense.
There are 14 Russians and Belarusians at the best 100 WTA, including the 1st ARYNA Sabalenka and World No. 9 Mirra Andreva. There are four Russians at the top of 100 ATP, two – Daniel Medvedev and Andre Rubelv – In the top ten. The empty area is next to their names, where their peers have their national flags, one of the remaining visible signs of the conflict in tennis rounds, as well as the absence of any events in those countries. When Sabalenka won the cup second place in the Australian Open in January, there was no Belarusian flag next to the American class of the winner, Madison Keys.
The players from Ukraine did not shake players from Russia or Belarus for three years, and with a few exceptions, they do not talk to each other in the championships. When Medvedev received a violation of the non -athletic behavior during a Dubai match on Thursday, the President of the referee, Adel Nour, asked him if he had punished him because of “double standards against the Russians.” Medvedev left the court after defeating Talon Grecsbur from the Netherlands without shaking Nour’s hand, but he said he had later apologized to the ruling.
Last week, on the third anniversary of the Russian invasion, Andreva and Roblef won the first championship in each of them. Roblef wrote “No war please” on the camera lens after arriving in the final of the tournament in Dubai, a day after the invasion of Russia. Andreva, who won with Diana Schneider with the silver medal in the women’s marital in the Paris Olympics, was asked in the Australian Open Championship about competition under her flag. “I would like to say that there is nothing I can do. It does not depend on me. Whatever happens. Andreva and Shnaider are competing as individual neutral athletes (AIN) in Paris games, wearing white.
Svetolina lost to Madison Keys, eventually at the Australian Open Championship in Melbourne. (Graham Dunholm / Getty Embs)
Early last month, Svetolina traveled to Ukraine, to hold meetings for its institution, which bears its name and conduct a clinic to support sports and mental health for a day for children from all over the country in Venicia, a small city about 200 miles southwest of the capital. Svetolina, her close friend and her compatriot Sergei Stikovsky, who retired from tennis to join the Ukraine army, spent six hours on the field with about 300 children.
This is not easy. Because of the war, travel to Kiev requires a 14 -hour trip from Monaco. First a trip to Poland, then a long train or car. She said that you can get a lot of it as children do.
“This is the little moment with smiles, laughter, this really shines their days, and this is what I want to share with them,” said Svetolina.
“I want to bring them this little hope for a better future.”
Svetolina’s parents remain with her and her husband, ATP Professional Gael Monfils, and their daughter SKAï, often in Monaco. But her 86 -year -old grandmother, Tamara, and her uncle, remains in Odyssea, the city of Port is still targeting Russian missile attacks with the fall of the night.
She hopes that her grandmother will spend more time in bombs, but she is elderly and prefers to stay at home in her apartment. Svetolina said that her grandmother promised her that when the missiles begin, the protocols will follow and stop the windows and between two walls to reduce the chances of breaking the glass, it will hit her if a close blow fell.
They speak almost every day, either by text messages or preferred over the phone or the Times, so that her grandmother can see SKAï. Svitolina is trying this time that calls for evening, when her work for this day is behind her. But sometimes the time difference does not allow this and it has to communicate in the morning, or from the tournament lands.
It is not really the perfect way to prepare for a tennis match, but Svitolina still makes the quarter -finals of the Australian Open. I went 2-2 during the latest tournaments in Doha, Qatar and Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, as the situation between Ukraine and the United States began to deteriorate. She is now heading to the California desert for BNP Paribas open in Indian Wales. In 2022, she came out of the event that wearing the flag of her yellow and blue country, 12 days after the condemnation of tennis governance bodies to invade her country.
After Trump’s meeting and Zellinski in Washington, DC, the messages of support on social media came from many political leaders in Europe.
“We are living with unimaginable challenges and pressure, and not knowing what will happen tomorrow,” said Svetolina.
“At the present time, I feel more united because we feel that the United States does not help us much over the past few weeks.
“So we have to unite, we have to help each other, to the country we love. Trump has just started and has already taken a lot of decisions that really harmed the Ukrainians. I am really sad for all innocents.”
(The upper image of Elena Svetolina in Indian Wales: Mario Jose Sanchez / Associated Press)
