Miami Open: Swiatek withdraws

Rib injury bothers top-ranked player

MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — Defending champion Iga Swiatek withdrew from the Miami Open on Wednesday because of a rib injury that she is hoping will heal during a break from competition.

The No. 1-ranked Swiatek, a 21-year-old from Poland, also will sit out her country’s Billie Jean King Cup qualifier matches against Kazakhstan on April 13-14.

“I wanted to wait ’til the last minute” to decide whether to play in Miami, Swiatek said at a news conference at the site of the hardcourt tournament that began Tuesday. “We were kind of checking if this is the kind of injury you can still play with or this is kind when you can get things worse. So I think the smart move for me is to pull out of this tournament because I want to rest and take care of it properly.”

She was supposed to face Claire Liu in the second round on Thursday.

As a seeded player, three-time Grand Slam champion Swiatek received a first-round bye at an event she won a year ago during a 37-match unbeaten run that was the longest in women’s tennis in a quarter of a century.

“I was also aware at the beginning of the season that it’s going to be hard for me to defend all these (ranking) points,” she said, “because ... these streaks, winning all these tournaments — looking logically and statistically, it’s not like it’s going to happen every year.”

Swiatek said after a 6-2, 6-2 loss to eventual champion Elena Rybakina in the BNP Paribas Open semifinals Friday that her rib was bothering her. She explained in Miami that the problem first surfaced late in her quarterfinal victory against Sorana Cirstea a day earlier in California.

▪ Former U.S. Open champions Emma Raducanu and Sloane Stephens were knocked out Wednesday, just hours after Swiatek pulled out.