According to media reports, a tennis tournament in the United Arab Emirates has been interrupted due to a security warning. The portal “The Athletic” and the newspaper “Gulfnews” reported on this, among others.
At the Challenger tournament in Fujairah, the match between Japan’s Hayato Matsuoka and Daniil Ostapenkow from Belarus was interrupted on Tuesday around 1:00 p.m. local time.
Video footage circulating online shows both players and the referee hastily leaving the pitch.
Matsuoka posted the video on his Instagram account and wrote that an alarm was triggered and the game was then interrupted.
Explosions were reportedly heard nearby. The reason for this is said to have been an attack by Iranian drones on the oil facilities in Fujairah. It was initially unclear whether and when the tournament could continue. The match between the young German professional Max Schönhaus and the Chinese Yi Zhou was originally scheduled for Tuesday.
Medvedev also had problems in the Emirates
Since Saturday, Iran has been attacking Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, among others, with hundreds of missiles and drones. These are retaliatory actions against US allies who attacked Iran together with Israel.
The ATP recently announced in a statement that it would closely monitor the situation in the Middle East and maintain contact with players and authorities. After the end of the men’s 500 tournament in Dubai, it became known that, among others, the winner Daniil Medvedev from Russia was stuck there and could not leave the country due to canceled flights.
