‘Hopefully, she can get back home,’ John Isner raises his voice on Brittney Griner’s wrongful detention by the Russian regime
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John Isner and Brittney Griner
The world hasn’t been normal ever since the Russian invasion of Ukraine a few months ago. People have called out the atrocities by the Russian regime and with time, things are getting worse and way too political. On the sporting front too, many acts and decisions reflect the impact of the ongoing war.
WNBA superstar Brittney Griner has been stuck in a Russian prison since February and despite all efforts, she is yet to be released. According to Russian officials, Griner was caught with vape cartridges containing oil derived from cannabis at a Moscow airport but given the current worldwide scenario where all diplomatic ties between the United States and Russia are at a standstill, it looks highly rigged.
American John Isner became the first tennis player to speak on Griner’s detention. Playing at the French Open, he addressed ATP’s ranking drop at Wimbledon 2022 in the post-match press conference after his first-round win. He said that he doesn’t know how the decision on scraping ranking points at Wimbledon will affect the playing field. He also disagreed with the decision to ban Russian and Belarussian players but said that he would prefer playing with ATP points.
“I don’t know how that’s going to affect the field. It’s going to have a different feel to it. You know, don’t personally agree with the decision to ban the players from Russia and Belarussia. But the players, we would also prefer to be playing for points, so I – but I get it. I’m not saying the ATP has made a wrong decision, but we would prefer to be playing with points,” he said.
‘The whole world just wants this to come to an end somehow’: John Isner on the Russia-Ukraine war
Isner further added that he understands the motive behind scrapping the ranking points and completely stands by it. But he strongly believes that Russian players have nothing to do with the invasion and hence Wimbledon’s ruling is unfair.
“But I definitely stand with the ATP in the sense that I believe these players should be playing. They don’t have anything to do with the invasion going on. You know, we all just want this, the whole world just wants this to come to an end somehow. It stinks that it’s interfered with sports, but that’s the way of the world now. It’s not just tennis,” he added.
He then said that a lot of sports have been affected by this and cited the example of basketball star Brittney Griner, who has been detained in Russia for the last 3 months.
“A lot of different sports have you know, the costs of this have been affected. You see Brittney Griner, for instance, is still in detention right now in Russia. That’s just crazy. Hopefully, she can get back home. Hopefully, next year all could be maybe back to normal,” he said.
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Lakshya Chopra
(2653 Articles Published)