The Ukrainian tennis player Lesia Tsurenko said she backs Wimbledon’s decision to ban Russian players from this year’s tournament after she was met with “silence” on the invasion of her home country by people she considered friends.
Tsurenko progressed to the third round of the women’s draw after recovering to beat her compatriot Anhelina Kalinina 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 in an emotional contest on Wednesday afternoon. Wearing a yellow and blue ribbon, in a break with the tournament’s longstanding all-white rules, the pair were cheered on by a crowd waving flags reading: “We stand with Ukraine.”
