Elina Svitolina taking break from tennis after 'extremely difficult' time following Russia's invasion of Ukraine
Elina Svitolina is taking a break from tennis due to a back injury and the “unbearable pain” of watching Russia invade her homeland of Ukraine. Svitolina threatened to boycott a match earlier this month against Russia's Anastasia Potapova unless tennis authorities ruled that Russian and Belarusian tennis players had to compete as “neutral athletes”. Ad/> That rule has since been enforced and Svitolina won two matches at the Monterrey Open before losing in the quarter-finals.


