Ukrainians united ahead of round-two encounter
UKRAINIAN pair Lesia Tsurenko and Anhelina Kalinina are united in wanting to use their second-round meeting at Wimbledon to help their war-torn country.
Tsurenko, who beat Great Britain’s Jodie Burrage in the first round, hopes their match will result in Ukraine being sent “heavy weapons” by allies to help defeat Russia.
Kalinina, a victor of Anna Bondar, wants to send prize money to aid her grandparents who are currently living in Russian-occupied territory.
Tsurenko, 33, is currently seeing a psychologist to focus on her tennis and has seen bombs explode just 100 metres from her house.
“I feel that I play better, just because for me emotionally winning or losing doesn’t exist anymore,” she said.
“For me, there is a big issue in my life: it’s war. And there is nothing else that can beat this.
“I think with all the sportsmen that are able to take part in the competitions, also with all the singers that go to Poland, to Germany, and having all the concerts, that part when Ukrainians can just go and remind the whole world that we are here, we still have war and we need your help.
“This is the main thing that I would wish to happen, that we get a lot of heavy weapons.
“You know, it’s just that we should remind with the fact that we are here and we are playing for my country, for Ukraine. We just want to remind that Ukraine is in trouble and we need help.
“For me, the toughest part now is that a lot of people that I know that they are on the front line now. One guy has been taken by Russians, so we don’t know what is going on with him.
“We know that he’s alive. Two more guys are fighting there at the moment, and a few people are dead already because of the war.”