Sony Ericsson WTA Tour Chairman and CEO Stacey Allaster announced at a press conference on Friday that Yanina Wickmayer has voluntarily withdrawn from the Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions.
Wickmayer was suspended on Thursday by a Belgian anti-doping tribunal for one year after failing to comply with regulations.
“As reported this morning, the Flemish Doping Tribunal has informed Yanina Wickmayer that effective immediately they are suspending her from competition due to three filing failures under the Belgian anti-doping whereabouts programme,” Allaster said.
“With this information Yanina herself has voluntarily withdrawn from the tournament and as a matter of policy the Tour will not make comment on an ongoing tennis anti-doping matter.”
Wickmayer’s place in the tournament will be filled by alternate Vera Dushevina, who will play Anabel Medina Garrigues in the last match on Friday. However, she will not inherit Wickmayer’s 1-0 record in the Group.
Kimiko Date Krumm will advance to the semi-finals from Group C, as even if Garrigues beats Dushevina to match Date Krumm’s 1-1 win/loss record, Date Krumm will advance having a head-to-head win/loss record over Garrigues at this event.
Hmm, she failed to report 3 times, so I don’t think they were out of place here. If it was once, well, fiine – maybe she wasnt well organised and couldnt attend. But 3 times? Also, this girl had disciplinary actions for attackin (physically) a ref on court. So, I think there could be a juice issue…
Yanina’s ban is ridiculous. If they’re going to treat tennis-players as criminals, why not fit them with electronic tags? And to ban Yanina in the middle of the Bali season-ending championships was utterly classless and cruel.
Marine, I think you’re being a bit too harsh on Yanina. She hasn’t been that bad on the court. We don’t know why she has not attended the testing sessions. We should wait on her statement about it.
Oh come on, she had 3 chances to prove the officials wrong. They have to do their job, they can’t just turn a blind eye on her even though she’s promising talent. They didn’t turn a blind eye on Hingis neither, even though she was a star.
Marine, Yanina didn’t test postive on a doping test, she didn’t even miss a test! And are you from Flanders or Belgium? If not, I don’t think you realize how the system works here.
If they hadn’t turned a blind eye to Hingis at some point, they would have realised that her urine-sample was switched.
Andrew, are you trying to say someone tried to get rid of martina?
Either that or gross incompetence.