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jake michaels
Melbourne, Australia — former world No. 1 Naomi Osaka She withdrew from her third round match at the Australian Open due to an abdominal injury a few hours before the start of the match.
The 28-year-old Osaka, a two-time champion at Melbourne Park, said on social media that she suffered the injury during a thrilling second-round win over Romania. Sorana Christia. In comments published by the tournament afterward, Osaka said she had a problem with her left stomach.
“It’s an injury I’ve had many times before and I thought I could overcome it,” she said. “I played my last match with some pain, and I thought if I rested myself before my match today, I would be able to handle it. But I got overheated and it got much worse.”
He said he would need further tests before deciding on long-term treatment.
“Obviously I think my body has changed a lot coming back from pregnancy,” she said. “So that’s something I have to be really careful about.”
Osaka had daughter Shai in July 2023 during a 15-month break from tennis. She returned to competition in 2024 and reached the semi-finals of a major tournament for the first time at last year’s US Open.
Osaka briefly went to the locker room during her second-round match and took a medical timeout when leading 2-1 in the deciding set.
“I had to make the difficult decision to withdraw in order to address something that my body needed to address after my last match,” Osaka posted on social media Saturday evening. “I was so excited to move on and this race meant the most to me, so stopping here breaks my heart but I can’t risk doing any more damage.
“Thank you for everyone’s love and support. I am so grateful that everyone has embraced me so much.”
He was to face the Australian qualifier madison inglis Rod Laver Arena after the 24-time Grand Slam champion novak djokovichave a match against Boutique Van De ZandschulpIt was a straight sets win Djokovic’s 400th career Grand Slam win.
Osaka won the Australian Open in 2019 and 2021. She won two other Grand Slam titles at the US Open, defeating Serena Williams in the 2018 final and Victoria Azarenka in 2020.
Inglis’s next match will be against number 2-ranked inga swatekWhich later led to a 6-1, 1-6, 6-1 win over No. 31 on Saturday Anna Kalinskaya. Swiatek was informed of Osaka’s withdrawal in an on-court interview after the match.
“Hopefully Naomi is OK. She was playing very well,” said Swiatek, who is bidding to complete the career Grand Slam in Australia. “It’s exciting to get to the fourth round again.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
