The war conflict between Russia and Ukraine It is leaving consequences in all areas and the tennis world is no exception. There are several Russian players who are beginning to get fed up with the difficulties of carrying that nationality in these times and with the suspicious looks of many teammates in the dressing room.
Such is the case of Varvara Gracheva. The 22-year-old, eighth-finalist at the Miami Open and who will be Top 50 for the first time in her career since next Monday, was seriously affected by the problems that the war brought her personally and asked to change his nationality.
According to the newspaper The team, the Russianfinalist this year at the WTA 250 in Austin (lost to Ukrainian Marta Kostiuk) is about to finish the procedures to become a French citizenwhere he has lived since 2016 with residence in Cannes.
The atmosphere between players from these countries is far from ideal. Many actions, such as not greeting each other online, statements and even decisions by Ukrainians who, for personal reasons, do not attend commitments against Russians, continuously demonstrate this.
A recent case involved Anastasia Potapova. The Russian, born in Saratov, entered an Indian Wells duel wearing the shirt of a soccer club from her country, causing a stir and comments of all kinds. For this conduct she received a reprimand.
Given this, the Ukrainian Marta KostiukNo. 38 in the world, who usually does not shake hands with her Russian and Belarusian rivals, and was eliminated this week from Miami against Potapova, spoke to the media and expressed her discomfort with many situations.
“We have requested a meeting with the leaders of our circuit to speak and the only response we have gotten is silence. There are a lot of things that the WTA does that I don’t agree with. Say what I say they will hate me more and more on social networks“, he affirmed according to testimonies collected by the newspaper Brand.
