There are a historic number of Russian and Belarusian players in the Wimbledon quarterfinals this year, the year after the tournament banned players from Russia and Belarus. Daniil Medvedev, Andrey Rublev, Roman Safiullin are Russian men’s quarterfinalists at Wimbledon, and Aryna Sabalenka (a Belarusian) is into the women’s QFs. Not to mention last year’s champion, Elena Rybakina, a Russian-born woman who plays for Kazakhstan, is also a quarterfinalist and her title defense is going very well.

Many of these players are in the top ten, so it’s not *that* remarkable that they’re playing well at a big tournament. It’s also worth noting that in Medvedev and Rublev’s case, they’re two of the most popular and charismatic players on the tour, and Wimbledon has acknowledged that by scheduling them on major show courts (Rublev even played on Centre Court in his fourth round). But trust the British media to once again make everything about Wimbledon’s royal patron, the Princess of Wales. Last year, the British press suggested that Wimbledon banned Russians and Belarusians specifically because of Kate, because Kate was too precious, delicate and important to (gasp) hand a trophy to a Russian, as if the mere act of handing a trophy to someone is an endorsement of the player’s national politics. So here’s some of the latest chapter of “OMG, Kate is going to have to speak to a Russian!!!” From the Telegraph: “Russians and Belarusians are taking over Wimbledon — it could be the Princess of Wales’ worst nightmare.”

Daniil Medvedev and Andrey Rublev might not have flags next to their name, nor the three letters RUS, as a result of their president’s bloodthirsty war in Ukraine. But with both men through to the quarter-finals, along with Belarus’s world No 2 Aryna Sabalenka, it’s easy to imagine the All England Club’s worst-case scenario coming to pass next weekend. That’s the one in which the Princess of Wales ends up presenting a trophy to one of these officially stateless players.

Such a conclusion would represent a nightmarish escalation of last year’s awkward plotline, which found Her Royal Highness shaking hands with Elena Rybakina – a Moscovite who plays under the Kazakh flag.

The desire to avoid these sorts of images – which could potentially be used as a propaganda tool by Vladimir Putin or Alexander Lukashenko – lay behind the AELTC’s original decision to ban Russians and Belarusians last summer. But the furious response from the two professional tours, who stripped rankings points from Wimbledon in 2022, left the club with no alternative but to back down.

[From The Telegraph]

Just like last year, I wonder why everyone is so desperate to include Kate into this storyline. Kensington Palace should have shut it down last year and they should shut it down this year as well – Kate is a grown woman, and her official position should be that “handing someone a trophy or plate is not an endorsement of the national politics of the player receiving the trophy or plate.” Kate did fine handing the Venus Rosewater dish to Rybakina last year – it was not a thing, the conversation was not “Kate endorses Russian and Kazakh politics!” Anyway, fingers crossed for Medvedev and Rublev, I love those Russians and I’m really rooting for them.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid, Cover Images.