World No. 1 Elena Rybakina will not compete at the WTA 1000 tournament in Wuhan, China. The Kazakh tennis player needs time to recover from a foot injury, the WTA said, according to infohub.kz.
The tournament organizers announced the player's withdrawal. Rybakina then addressed the fans who had hoped to see her on court, thanking them for their support.
"I'm very sorry for the fans who were looking forward to my performance. I will need some time to rest and recover. Thank you for your understanding and continued support. See you next year," Rybakina said.
The competition in Wuhan will take place from October 12 to 18 and will be the last WTA 1000 tournament of the season. Last year, the Kazakh player reached the quarterfinals here.
The decision to skip the tournament followed an early exit in Beijing. Earlier, Kursiv wrote that after winning the US Open, Elena Rybakina lost in the first round of the China Open. In the second round, Rybakina fell to Armenia's Alina Charaeva, ranked 118th in the world. The Kazakh won the first set but lost the next two — 6-3, 4-6, 3-6.