Play is getting underway at the Cincinnati Open, with No. 3 seed and recent Wimbledon champion Iga Swiatek facing Anna Kalinskaya for a spot in the semi-finals.
Kalinskaya hit out at the WTA when their quarter-final was scheduled first on Friday at 11am local time, after her last match started on Wednesdan night and finished in the early hours on Thursday, and she didn’t get to bed until 4am.
“How can the WTA and tournament expect athletes to perform their best when the scheduling is unfair?” she wrote in an Instagram story.
“After my match against Alexandrova, I got home from the site at 2:40 am and didn’t go to bed until 4 am. I slept a bit and came to the site to practice.”
“Then I get scheduled at 11 am for tomorrow’s match—how does the tournament and WTA expect me to recover and continuously adjust my sleep pattern, which is one of the most important aspects of recovery? Seems a bit one sided.”
