MOSCOW, September 23. /TASS/. Russia's top female racquet Mirra Andreeva has advanced to Round 3 of the 2026 Singapore Open Tennis tournament after defeating on Wednesday Alexandra Sasnovich of Belarus.
In a match that lasted for little over than one hour and ten minutes the Russian, who is playing under a neutral status at international tournaments, cruised past her Belarusian opponent with straight-sets win 6-2; 6-2.
She is now set to play in the next round of the tournament against Canada’s 6th-seed Leylah Fernandez, who outplayed in the previous round Alycia Parks of the United States 6-4; 6-3.
Andreeva, 19, is currently ranked 5th in the Top-10 of the WTA Rankings. She won the French Open in June and is a six-time WTA title holder overall. In 2023, Andreeva was named WTA rookie of the year. At the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, she won a silver medal in women’s doubles paired with Diana Shnaider.
The 2026 Singapore Open is the WTA 500 class tournament played on hard courts of the OCBC Arena in Singapore on September 21-27 and it offers $1.2 million in prize money.
Russian players’ neutral status at tennis tournaments
On February 28, 2022, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) issued recommendations to international sports federations to exclude athletes from Russia and Belarus from taking part in international tournaments, citing Moscow's special military operation in Ukraine as the reason.
Following the IOC's recommendations in late February 2022, the majority of global sports federations decided to exclude athletes from Russia and Belarus from all international sports tournaments.
The International Tennis Federation (ITF) ruled on March 1, 2022 to suspend the membership of the Russian and Belarusian national tennis federations while also scrapping all previously scheduled tennis tournaments in the two countries.
On March 14, 2022, the ITF also confirmed its prohibition on the Russian and Belarusian national tennis teams from taking part in the 2022 Davis Cup and 2022 Billie Jean King Cup.