{"id":633849,"date":"2026-04-27T10:17:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T10:17:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/633849\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T10:17:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T10:17:10","slug":"tennis-2026-fans-rally-around-grand-slam-champ-after-forced-retirement-sparks-sad-scenes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/633849\/","title":{"rendered":"Tennis 2026: Fans rally around grand slam champ after forced retirement sparks sad scenes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tennis<\/a> fans and commentators are sending well-wishes to Iga Swiatek <\/a>after the six-time grand slam champ broke down in tears after being forced to retire from the Madrid Open. The World No.4 was trailing 0-3 in the deciding third set against American 31st seed Ann Li when she was forced to call it quits.<\/p>\n

The Polish star had asked for the doctor after having her serve broken early in the third set. She got her vitals checked and was given the all-clear to continue, but pulled the plug on the contest soon after.<\/p>\n

\"Iga<\/p>\n

Iga Swiatek has been battling a stomach virus. Image: Getty<\/p>\n

A four-time French Open winner and the reigning Wimbledon champ, Swiatek revealed after the match that she’d been fighting a stomach virus for the last two days and feeling “terrible”. She told reporters: “I heard there is something going on between players, that the virus is somewhere on site.<\/p>\n

“I’m sure I’ll be fine in a couple of days, but I had zero energy and zero stability and just felt really bad physically, and yesterday even worse. I knew that it was going to be hard but I still wanted to try.<\/p>\n

“In the third set, I started feeling a little bit dizzy and not really co-ordinated. I couldn\u2019t really drink anything because I just felt like I’m full constantly, and the energy went down drastically.”<\/p>\n

It marked Swiatek’s earliest exit from the Madrid Open in five career appearances. “On the court before the tournament I felt like I’m playing great, so actually it’s sad for me that I can’t play, because I was feeling really good with my game, and I was moving forward in the process, so, this was positive,” she said. “But for me the tournament has just started and I couldn’t even compete today, so it’s disappointing.”<\/p>\n

\"Iga<\/p>\n

Iga Swiatek broke down in tears as she left the court.<\/p>\n

(Getty Images)Stomach bug sweeping through Madrid Open<\/p>\n

Tennis fans were quick to rally around Swiatek, sending messages of support. The French Open is still a month away, where Swiatek will be one of the favourites to capture the Roland Garros title for the fifth time. The 24-year-old won the French Open in 2020, 2022, 2023 and 2024. She also won the US Open in 2022 and Wimbledon in 2025.<\/p>\n

On Sunday it was Coco Gauff who became the latest victim of the stomach virus, but the American still found a way to beat Sorana Cirstea 4-6 7-5 6-1. Gauff vomited in a bin on the side of the court, but managed to prevail.<\/p>\n

\"Coco<\/p>\n

Coco Gauff overcame illness to win.<\/p>\n

(Eurasia Sport Images via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

“I don’t know, honestly (how I got through that),” said Gauff. “I was just trying to finish the match and one point turned into another. I think I got what everybody else is having here in Madrid, unfortunately. So, I’m just going to try to push through for tomorrow.”<\/p>\n

Liudmila Samsonova pulled out of the tournament on Sunday due to illness ahead of her third-round match with Linda Noskova.<\/p>\n

with agencies<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tennis fans and commentators are sending well-wishes to Iga Swiatek after the six-time grand slam champ broke down…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":633850,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,18937,1805,2636,280666,85,307031,747],"class_list":{"0":"post-633849","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-coco-gauff","11":"tag-french-open","12":"tag-iga-swiatek","13":"tag-madrid-open","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-stomach-virus","16":"tag-tennis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=633849"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633849\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/633850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=633849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=633849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=633849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}