The Swiss tennis contingent suffered another major blow after Belinda Bencic pulled out of the Rio Olympics citing a busy schedule.
The 16th-ranked Bencic had sustained a wrist injury during her second-round match against Julia Boserup at Wimbledon last month, and hasn’t featured on court ever since.
The 19-year-old insists that although she has recovered from the injury, she is running behind schedule, and that participating at the Games would hinder her preparations for the American hard-court swing.
“It is with a heavy heart that I have to withdraw from this year’s Olympics,” she wrote on her Facebook page.
She continued: “Although I have recovered from the wrist injury that I sustained at Wimbledon at the end of June, I am behind in my training schedule and am therefore not completely ready to take part in Rio.
“I will be using the next few weeks to fully prepare with my coach Melanie Molitor for Cincinnati, New Haven and the US Open.”
This comes on the back of Switzerland’s premier tennis player Roger Federer’s withdrawal, who has not yet fully recovered from a knee injury.
Bencic was originally projected to join forces with compatriots Stanislas Wawrinka and Martina Hingis in the mixed and women’s doubles events respectively, besides contesting in the singles.
