Maria Sakkari and Caroline Garcia rubbish Elena Rybakina’s ‘last-minute’ narrative

Maria Sakkari and Carolina Garcia have responded to Elena Rybakina’s claims that the WTA Tour made a last minute call to reintroduce performance byes for part of the Asian Swing.

Sakkari and Garcia received performance byes for the Tokyo Open with the initative seemingly catching Rybakina off guard.

The 2022 Wimbledon champion would witthdraw from the Tokyo Open stating that she wasn’t ready to play in the first round and had expected a bye as the third seed.

However, both Sakkari and Garcia say that the WTA Tour had advised players of the change earlier in the year and also just before the Asian swing.

Sakkari, who earned herself another performance bye for the China Open with a run to the last four in Tokyo to back up her maiden WTA 1000 title in Guadalajara, was asked about the performance bye issue in Tokyo and was quick to shut down the claim that the changes were last minute.

“This is not a new rule, I think it has been in place for about 14 years, and that’s actually the case,” Sakkari said.

“However, due to the coronavirus pandemic, this rule was temporarily removed. However, in the past, this performance bye was also used in Beijing. We have already been aware of the fact that there will be a performance bye since the tournament will be held from Mexico to Tokyo for about 5 months.

“I was informed that performance byes are also applied when travelling from Tokyo to Beijing.”

Garcia defended the change, which has been instituted to avoid puinishing players for having a deep run the week before.

The Frenchwoman believes that the change was necessary given the two-day trip from Mexico to Japan and China.

“It’s a really long journey from Mexico to Japan, and considering the time difference, you’ll lose two days,” Garcia said.

“I think this rule is necessary because we have to continue playing under such circumstances. In the past, it was also adopted in Beijing and Wuhan.

“We knew in advance that there would be a performance bye at this tournament. We were informed of this, and I think this is important in order to maintain our rhythm.”

Rybakina is the No 3 seed for the China Open and has been handed a tough first round draw in the shape of top-ranked Chinese player Zheng Qinwen.

Garcia will face a qualifier in the first round at the China Open, while Sakkari will take on the winner of the first round match between Linda Fruhvitova and Arantxa Rus in her opening match in Beijing.

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