French Open 2023: Marta Kostyuk of Ukraine refused to shake hands after losing to Belarus’ Aryna Sabalenka, booed out of court

Unable to sleep the night before her first-round match at the French Open against Belarus’ Aryna Sabalenka, the Grand Slam tournament’s No. 2 seed, Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk checked her phone at 5 a.m. on Sunday and decided to return home to Kiev. But saw disturbing news. At least one person was killed when the country’s capital of Kostyuk was subjected to the biggest drone strike by Russia since the start of the war that began with an invasion aided by Belarus in February 2022.

“It’s something I can’t describe, probably. I try to put my emotions aside whenever I go on the court. I feel like I’m better than ever, and I don’t think it’s going to stop me.” Affects that much on a daily basis, but yeah, it’s just — I don’t know,” Kostyuk said, shaking his head. “There’s really not much to say. It’s just part of my life.

Therefore, Kostyuk has decided not to exchange the usual post-match pleasantries with her opponents from Russia or Belarus. And that’s why she avoided shaking hands even after her 6-3, 6-2 loss to reigning Australian Open champion Sabalenka at the French Open 2023 at Roland Garros.

Marta Kostyuk said she doesn’t respect Arya Sabalenka:

“To disavow her responsibility to have an opinion on the most important things in the world, I cannot respect her. She said I hate her. I never said I hate her, I just respect her.” does not”

pic.twitter.com/fF76Bw2Trk– The Tennis Letter (@TheTennisLetter) May 28, 2023

The 20-year-old, 39th-ranked Kostyuk was surprised by the reaction she got from spectators at Court Philippe Chatrier on Sunday: They booed and derisively whistled when she went to acknowledge the chair umpire instead of directly congratulating the umpire. rang. Winner after one-sided result. As she gathered her belongings and walked off the court to the locker room, the negative reaction grew louder.

“I have to say,” Kostyuk said, “I didn’t expect this. … People should be honestly ashamed.

Kostyuk is now in Monaco, and his mother and sister are there too, but his father and grandfather are still in Kiev. Perhaps the fans in the main stadium of the clay-court event were unaware of the backstory and felt that Kostyuk had failed to follow normal tennis etiquette. Initially, Sabalenka – who had been approaching the net as anticipating some sort of exchange with Kostyuk – thought the noise was directed at her.

Sabalenka said, “At first I thought they were hooting me.” “I was a little confused, and I was like, ‘Okay, what should I do?’

Sabalenka tried to ask the chair umpire what was going on. He also saw his crew in the stands. Then she realized that while she knew that Kostyuk and other Ukrainian tennis players were refusing to greet opponents from Russia or Belarus after a match, the audience might not know—and so responded in a way that Sabalenka didn’t think she was worthy. “They saw it,” she surmised, “as disrespect for me.”

Overall, if the tennis itself was not particularly memorable, the whole scene, including the lack of the customary prematch photo of the players after the coin toss, became the most notable event on the first day in Paris.

The highest-seeded player going home was No. 7 Maria Sakkari, who lost 7–6(5), 7–5 to 42nd-ranked Karolina Muchova in what was not necessarily a turnaround moment. Both have been major semifinalists, and Muchova has won her last four Slam matches against players ranked in the top 10 – including defeating Sakkari at the French Open last year. Also out: No. 21 Magda Linette, a semifinalist at the Australian Open, lost 6-3, 1-6, 6-3 to 2021 US Open runner-up Leyla Fernandez and No. 29 Zhang Shuai.

Stefanos Tsitsipas reaches second round

The first seeded men to exit were No. 20 Dan Evans and No. 30 Ben Shelton, an Australian Open quarterfinalist and 2022 NCAA champion from Florida, who made his French Open debut. No. 11 Karen Khachanov, a semifinalist in the last two majors, came all the way back after dropping the opening two sets, defeating a French player 3-6, 1-6, 6-2 in front of a raucous crowd on Court Suzanne Lenglen. , 6-1, 6-3 score.

Two-time Slam finalist Stefanos Tsitsipas came within a point of even forcing a fifth set, but he overcame Jiri Vesely 7–5, 6–3, 4–6, 7–6(7). No. 24 Sebastian Korda, who missed three months at the Australian Open after injuring his wrist, was a straight-sets winner in an all-American matchup against Mackenzie McDonald, the last to face and beat Rafael Nadal. He was a player. Since that match in January, the 14-time French Open champion has been sidelined with a hip injury.

Sabalenka called Sunday “emotionally difficult” – for mundane, tennis-related reasons, such as the nerves that come with any first-round match, but more importantly because of the unusual circumstances associated with war. “You’re playing against (a) Ukrainian and you never know what’s going to happen. You never know how people will do – will they support you or not?” Sabalenka explained, going down an early break and trailing 3-2 before winning six games in a row with powerful first-strike hitting. “I was worried, like, people would be against me, and I don’t like to play when people are against me.”

A journalist from Ukraine asked Sabalenka what her message was to the world regarding the war, specifically in this context: she could overtake Inga Swiatek as No. 1 in the rankings based on the results in the next two weeks and Therefore, act as a role model.

“Nobody in this world, Russian athletes or Belarusian athletes, supports war. Nobody. How can we support war? Nobody – normal people – will ever support it. Why (do) we insist To go by and say those things? It’s like this: ‘One plus one (is) two.’ Of course we do not support war,” Sabalenka said. “If it can affect the war in any way, if it would prevent it, we will do it. But unfortunately, it is not in our hands.”

When part of those remarks were read to Kostyuk by a reporter, he replied in a calm, measured tone that he did not understand why Sabalenka did not come out and said that “she is personally aware of this war”. does not support.”

Kostyuk also dismissed the notion that players from Russia or Belarus could be in trouble upon their return to those countries if they were to speak out about what is happening in Ukraine. “I don’t know why it’s a difficult situation,” Kostyuk said with a laugh.

“I don’t know what the other players are afraid of,” he said. “I go back to Ukraine, where I can die any second from a drone or missile or whatever.”