“No thoughts, no emotions,” Sabalenka told reporters. “I just want to quit tennis right now. But hopefully, I’ll get back on track.<\/p>\n
“I had very good opportunities in the second set. I screwed up and she played great. Mentally, I couldn’t really recover after the second set.<\/p>\n
“I don’t know when was the last time it happened to me, losing 10 games in a row. Mentally, I got in a deep dark hole and I couldn’t get back mentally on track.”<\/p>\n
But Williams is confident that Sabalenka will be back on court soon and that her comments come from a place of “disappointment.”<\/p>\n
![\"picture\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/image-d59de51b-5d21-4729-a8d9-306ff684090e-85-2560-1440.jpeg\")
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Watch as stunned experts react to Sabalenka’s ‘meltdown’ against Shnaider<\/p>\n
Video credit: TNT Sports<\/p>\n
“She leaves it all on the court. You see everything she feels on the court,” Williams, who has won seven singles and 14 doubles Grand Slams, said<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201dPerhaps maybe take a little more time if you need to before the press conference because I don\u2019t think she wants to quit tennis. That would be a tragedy for tennis and a tragedy for her. But when you lose, it\u2019s just so, like, ugh. The inner struggle is real.\u201d<\/p>\n The defeat comes as Sabalenka celebrates her 85th week as the world No. 1 and still the formidable force in women’s tennis.<\/p>\n The Belarusian is a four-time Grand Slam winner and was a runner-up at the French Open last year.<\/p>\n And Williams praised the honest reaction Sabalenka gave following her defeat to Shnaider.<\/p>\n \u201dI like that she lets us in, lets us be a part of her world in that way. What happened today happens to every player at some point in time,” the former world No. 1 said. <\/p>\n “And it hurts. The worst part is that you let your own self down. And to deal with letting yourself down is the hardest thing in the world.<\/p>\n \u201dIf you just get beat, you just get beat. If somebody wiped you off the court, you got beat; they played better. You can deal with that. But right now she\u2019s dealing with her own disappointment. It\u2019s hard to sleep at night with that.<\/p>\n ‘She’ll overcome it’ – Henman backs Sabalenka to learn from French Open ‘meltdown’<\/p>\n Video credit: TNT Sports<\/p>\n \u201dWhat I\u2019ll also say is that any of us would take the year she\u2019s had. I think she\u2019s just amplifying in this moment. <\/p>\n “But she\u2019s had a great year. I don\u2019t think she should have any regrets. This should make her stronger.\u201d<\/p>\n Sabalenka now turns her attention towards the grass-court season with Wimbledon beginning on Monday, June 29.<\/p>\n Add TNT Sports as a preferred source\u00a0here\u00a0<\/a>to enjoy more\u00a0content like this.\u00a0Stream every court from the 2026 French Open exclusively live on TNT Sports and HBO Max<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Highlights: Shnaider defeats Sabalenka in massive shock to reach semi-finals Video credit: TNT Sports Sabalenka had led No.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":622649,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[205898,101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-622648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-roland-garros-womens-singles-2026-w","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=622648"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622648\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/622649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=622648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=622648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=622648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"picture\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/1780663340_332_image-3abe03de-2d9c-414f-9b19-1c981e460a73-85-2560-1440.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n