Tennis

6:16 PM ET Associated Press LONDON — Chilean tennis player Barbara Gatica Aviles has been banned from the sport for three years after admitting she was paid to deliberately lose a match in 2016, the International Tennis Integrity Agency said Thursday. The 26-year-old Gatica Avilés, whose career-best WTA ranking is No. 158, was also fined

8:54 AM ET Associated Press LONDON — Iga Swiatek and Rafael Nadal were honored by the International Tennis Federation as its 2022 ITF World Champions on Thursday after each claimed two Grand Slam titles this season. The ITF determines its awards based on criteria that include all events and give special weight to the four

7:27 AM ET German tennis star Boris Becker, 55, has been freed from a British prison, the government said on Thursday, meaning he is now expected to be deported from the country. In April, Becker, a six-time Grand Slam champion, was jailed for two years and six months by a London court for hiding hundreds

7:56 AM ET British No. 1 Emma Raducanu branded comments about her as untrue as she said the attention she has received after her meteoric rise in tennis has been “intense.” Raducanu, who received an MBE award from King Charles for her services to tennis, broke onto the scene with an impressive Wimbledon campaign in

12:54 PM ET Associated Press Iga Swiatek was honored as WTA Player of the Year for the first time on Monday after rising to No. 1 in the rankings in April and remaining there for the rest of the season thanks in part to two Grand Slam titles. Swiatek, a 21-year-old from Poland who was

11:58 AM ET Associated Press LONDON — Two low-ranked French tennis players were banned from the sport for life after being found guilty of match-fixing by a hearing officer. Jules Okala, a 25-year-old with a career-best ATP ranking of No. 338, and Mick Lescure, a 29-year-old with a top ranking of No. 487, “admitted multiple

9:55 AM ET Associated Press LONDON — Top 100 tennis player Kamil Majchrzak was provisionally suspended for doping after testing positive for banned substances at three tournaments in September and October. The International Tennis Integrity Agency announced the ruling Friday, saying the 26-year-old from Poland turned in A samples at the Sofia Open, Japan Open

8:50 AM ET The ATP on Wednesday fined Britain’s Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) £820,000 ($1 million) for banning male players from Russia and Belarus from this year’s summer grasscourt events ahead of the Championships over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Players were banned from the UK grass-court tournaments held in the build-up to Wimbledon, which became

10:16 PM ET Associated Press MELBOURNE, Australia — Novak Djokovic will open his 2023 campaign in Adelaide as he prepares for a shot at a 10th Australian Open crown a year after having his visa revoked on the eve of his title defense. Djokovic, a 21-time major winner, has been granted a visa by the

2:18 PM ET Associated Press Two-time Grand Slam finalist Karolina Pliskova is reuniting with coach Sascha Bajin ahead of the 2023 tennis season. Pliskova posted on her website and her Twitter account on Tuesday about the move, which comes about six months after she and Bajin stopped working together. The pair originally teamed up in

8:49 AM ET Associated Press LAS VEGAS — Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz will resume their rivalry for the ages in an exhibition match in Las Vegas on March 5. Nadal, who is 36, owns a men’s-record 22 Grand Slam titles, including two in 2022 at the Australian Open in January and French Open in

Dec 6, 2022 Associated Press LONDON — The Hopman Cup tennis competition that pairs one woman and one man from each participating country will return next year and be played in Nice, France. The International Tennis Federation announced Tuesday that the matches will be held on July 19-23. The Nice Lawn Tennis Club will be

10:04 AM ET ESPN News Services Nick Bollettieri, the Hall of Fame tennis coach who worked with some of the sport’s biggest stars, including Andre Agassi and Monica Seles, and founded an academy that revolutionized the development of young athletes, has died. He was 91. Bollettieri died Sunday night at home in Florida after a

12:40 PM ET Associated Press Teenager Carlos Alcaraz is the youngest year-end No. 1 in the history of the ATP computerized rankings and joins fellow Spaniard Rafael Nadal as the first players from the same country to claim the top two spots at the close of a season since Americans Pete Sampras and Michael Chang

7:13 PM ET Dan HajduckyESPN Close Hajducky is a reporter/researcher for ESPN. He has an MFA in creative writing from Fairfield University and played on the men’s soccer teams at Fordham and Southern Connecticut State universities. The 2023 Australian Open will be the first sensory inclusive international sporting event, KultureCity, a nonprofit which trains staff

1:27 PM ET Associated Press PARIS — The Ultimate Tennis Showdown, a league founded by coach Patrick Mouratoglou that played exhibition matches when the pro tours were shut down during the coronavirus pandemic, plans to return in 2023 with four events. The UTS announced Thursday that it will hold matches in July, September, November and

9:10 AM ET Associated Press LONDON — Former top-10 professional tennis player Fernando Verdasco accepted a voluntary provisional doping suspension of two months after testing positive for a medication for ADHD, the International Tennis Integrity Agency announced Wednesday. Verdasco, who turned 39 this month, said he was taking methylphenidate as medication prescribed by his doctor

1:21 PM ET British tennis player Emma Raducanu was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) on Tuesday, a little more than a year after she shocked the sporting world when she became the first qualifier to win a Grand Slam. The then-18-year-old Raducanu catapulted her career to new heights when