After Rafael Nadal, Serena Williams withdraws her name from Tokyo Olympics

In a massive development ahead of the Tokyo Olympics, veteran Tennis player Serena Williams has pulled out her name from the upcoming global event. During her pre-Wimbledon video conference with reporters on Sunday, Serena Williams confirmed this and announced that she will not go to the Tokyo Olympics. Earlier, Spanish Tennis stalwart Rafael Nadal pulled out of the Wimbledon 2021 Championships and the Tokyo Olympics. 

"I’m actually not on the Olympic list. Not that I’m aware of. If so, then I shouldn’t be on it,” said Serena Williams during the press conference. 

“There's a lot of reasons that I made my Olympic decision,” Williams said on Sunday, the day before the start of main-draw action at Wimbledon, where she will try to collect her 24th Grand Slam singles title. “I don’t really want to — I don’t feel like going into them today. Maybe another day. Sorry.”

Asked what it will be like to sit out the Summer Games, Williams replied: “I have not thought about it. In the past, it’s been a wonderful place for me. I really haven’t thought about it, so I’m going to keep not thinking about it.”

Serena Williams, 39-year-old, has won four gold medals at Summer Games for the United States: in both singles and doubles at the 2012 London Olympics and in doubles at the 2000 Sydney Olympics and 2008 Beijing Olympics.

All of her doubles golds were won with her older sister, Venus, as her partner. At the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games, Serena Williams lost in the third round of singles to Elina Svitolina of Ukraine, and the siblings were beaten in the first round of doubles. Before that, they had been 15-0 as an Olympic doubles team.

Rafael Nadal Pulls Out Of Wimbledon & Tokyo Olympics

Earlier, Rafael Nadal took to his Twitter handle and shared a detailed statement regarding his massive decision and cited the short time interval between the recently concluded French Open and the upcoming Wimbledon Championships as the reason. Rafael Nadal lost to Novak Djokovic at the French Open 2021 semifinal. In their 58th career clash, world number one Djokovic triumphed over Nadal, doing so for the second time, and ultimately went to win the French Open 2021. 

On his Twitter handle, Nadal had written, "Hi all, I have decided not to participate at this year’s Championships at Wimbledon and the Olympic Games in Tokyo. It’s never an easy decision to take but after listening to my body and discuss it with my team I understand that it is the right decision."

(Image Credits: AP)