Paula Badosa and Karolina Muchova ‘without respect’ suggests WTA doubles player

Paula Badosa and Karolina Muchova have been criticised by WTA doubles player Irina Khromacheva, after they pulled out of the tournament following their first round victory.

Badosa and Muchova teamed up in Beijing for the first time, ending the eight-match winning streak of Khromacheva and her partner Anna Danilina in the first round on Sunday.

When @karomuchova7 takes charge of the point like that…@paulabadosa bows down to her team mate 🙇‍♀️😂#ChinaOpen pic.twitter.com/wkWsvvJYLw

— wta (@WTA) September 27, 2024

However, the new pairing elected to withdraw from their second round match, gifting Veronika Kudermetova and Hao-Ching Chan a bye to the quarter-finals.

Both Badosa and Muchova are still in singles competition at the WTA 1000 event, and Khromacheva has not taken too kindly to this in a strongly worded post on Instagram.

“Bravo WTA. We lost to singles players in doubles in Beijing tournament… And second round they are pulling out cause they don’t care about doubles… but they continue to play singles this week…” said the doubles World No.28. “Completely crazy by taking place of teams who could enter and participate fully…

“I had this situation twice this year that when they won first round they pulling out… Without respect to doubles players… And also for people who are signing on-site trying to get in… Very nice rule. Plus tournament losing one match on the schedule… Respect in WTA tour, no didn’t hear it exists… Crazy.”

Khromacheva hinted that this is not the first time that this has happened to her this year, with the team of Badosa and Victoria Azarenka also beating herself and Ekaterina Alexandrova before withdrawing in Berlin.

Badosa progressed to the quarter-finals of the China Open singles tournament earlier today, while Muchova will be looking to join her when playing Cristina Bucsa.

Inside the baseline…

This is a very interesting situation, and Irina Khromacheva’s frustrations are very much understandable. Karolina Muchova and Paula Badosa have both had a lot of serious injury struggles in recent times, but at the same time if they were not intending to play the whole doubles tournament then they probably should not have entered, as it makes a bit of a mockery of the doubles specialists who miss out as a result of their entry. This is especially relevant in Badosa’s case, as she this is the third time that she has done this in 2024.

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