Germany’s best tennis player, Angelique Kerber, did not accept the wild card reserved by the Berlin Lawn Tennis Tournament.
Before the third Grand Slam tournament of the year in Wimbledon on June 27, the former number 1 in the world will only play the event in Bad Homburg, where she is a tournament ambassador.
After her third-round failure at the French Open, Kerber cited a lack of appreciation from the Berlin organizers as a reason for not wanting to compete in the capital. “We called Paris and cleared that up. There was indeed a misunderstanding due to an unfortunate email,” said tournament director Barbara Rittner of the German Press Agency.
Nevertheless, the three-time Grand Slam tournament winner Kerber could not bring herself to start in Berlin. “The email is by no means the reason why she doesn’t start here. Physically, she simply cannot imagine playing three tournaments in a row and is therefore only training at the moment,” said Rittner.
Despite the cancellations of the top three in the world rankings, Iga Swiatek, Anett Kontaveit and Paula Badosa, as well as the former world number ones Naomi Osaka and Wiktoria Asarenza, she was satisfied with the starting field. “We have the Paris finalist Coco Gauff, the Olympic champion Belinda Bencic, Wimbledon finalist Karolina Pliskova and the two-time Grand Slam winner Garbine Muguruza here. That’s something to be proud of,” said Rittner.