07 July 2023 , 14:43
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Paula Badosa had to awkwardly inform a reporter she had lost her second-round match after a back injury ended her Wimbledon campaign.
The Spaniard was forced to retire when trailing 6-2 1-0 to Marta Kostyuk after her troublesome stress fracture flared up and she revealed she will not be able to play the mixed doubles with her boyfriend Stefanos Tsitsipas.
To add insult to injury, news of her fitness struggles on Court 18 had clearly not reached an international reporter, who opened her post-match press conference by congratulating her on her victory, prompting a toe-curling exchange.
Responding to the opening comment, Badosa simply replied: “I lost.”
The reporter did not acknowledge her answer and asked her to talk about her fitness and confidence level, to which she replied: “For your information, I just lost. I didn’t win. So, yeah.”
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The moderator then again informed the journalist Badosa had lost, which was received by surprise.
Once the result had been established in the room, Badosa went on to say that she will be withdrawing from the mixed doubles due to the problem, robbing fans of a on-court love story. Asked whether she would be able to compete: “No, no, I won’t be able. The injury is the same as I have been struggling the past weeks.
“It’s the stress fracture. I tried my best to try to play here, but yesterday when I woke up I already, after my first-round match, felt it again. It’s a little bit worse. So I will need a few days off and talk to my team and see what I do in the next days and the next weeks.
“The first match I was pretty happy because I felt OK. After the match I spoke with my team, and I was, like, it wasn’t very bad.
“But yesterday, as I said when I woke up, I was worse. Today was worse. I wanted to give it a try in the match, but I think the smartest thing was to stop.”
Kostyuk will play 25th seed Maddison Keys after the American beat Viktorija Golubic 7-5 6-3 while two-time champion Petra Kvitova beat Aliaksandra Sasnovich 6-2 6-2 to reach the third round.