Naomi Osaka has withdrawn from the 2026 Australian Open due to an injury shortly before her third round match and admitted having to stop her run \u201cbreaks my heart.\u201d<\/p>\n
The four-time major winner was due to face 168th-ranked Australian qualifier Maddison Inglis in the last match on Rod Laver Arena on Saturday night.<\/p>\n
However, Osaka<\/a> announced during the penultimate match on Rod Laver Arena \u2014 Novak Djokovic\u2019s third round contest against Botic van de Zandschulp \u2014 that she had pulled out.<\/p>\n Osaka, an Australian Open<\/a> champion in 2019 and 2021, revealed the unfortunate news in a statement on Instagram.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve had to make the difficult decision to withdraw to address something my body needs attention for after my last match,\u201d wrote Osaka.<\/p>\n \u201cI was so excited to keep going and this run meant the most to me, so having to stop here breaks my heart, but I can\u2019t risk doing any further damage so I can get back on the court.<\/p>\n Naomi Osaka criticised by two former world No 1\u2019s after Sorana Cirstea controversy at Australian Open<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Naomi Osaka apologises for \u2018disrespectful\u2019 comment as she and Sorana Cirstea clarify Australian Open clash<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Want more from Tennis365? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list<\/a> for tennis coverage you can trust.<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cThanks for all the love and support\u2026 I\u2019m so grateful everyone embraced me so much. And thank you to my whole team for always having my back and the tournament organisers for being so kind.\u201d<\/p>\n An abdominal injury was cited as the reason for Osaka\u2019s withdrawal.<\/p>\n Osaka had battled to earn three-set wins against Antonia Ruzic and Sorana Cirstea in her first and second round matches at Melbourne Park.<\/p>\n The former world No 1 made plenty of headlines during her Australian Open campaign; starting with the fashion statement she made before her opening round match.<\/p>\n The Japanese star entered the court for her match with Ruzic wearing a jellyfish-inspired turquoise and white outfit that featured a veil and umbrella<\/a>.<\/p>\n Osaka then sparked complaints from Cirstea in the pair\u2019s second round contest by saying \u201ccome on\u201d to herself between her Romanian opponent\u2019s first and second serves.<\/p>\n The 28-year-old faced criticism from WTA Tour legends Martina Navratilova and Lindsay Davenport over her \u201ctennis etiquette\u201d against Cirstea.<\/p>\n Novak Djokovic\u2019s wife, Jelena Djokovic, took to Instagram to label Osaka\u2019s actions against Cirstea \u201cdisrespectful.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m surprised that this is not being called hindrance,\u201d Jelena Djokovic wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cIn between two serves, when crowds are applauding or shouting, the chair umpire asks not to shout between serves as it is disturbing to the player.<\/p>\n \u201cThe point is not finished. Sorana missed her first serve and is focusing on getting in the second, it is a slight pause. And is disrespectful to applaud at someone\u2019s first serve mistake too.\u201d<\/p>\n READ NEXT: Naomi Osaka\u2019s Australian Open outfit labelled \u2018iconic\u2019 and \u2018a contradiction\u2019 by Boris Becker<\/a> The post Naomi Osaka withdraws from Australian Open after she dominated headlines<\/a> appeared first on Tennis365<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Naomi Osaka has withdrawn from the 2026 Australian Open due to an injury shortly before her third round match and admitted having to stop her run \u201cbreaks my heart.\u201d The four-time major winner was due to face 168th-ranked Australian qualifier Maddison Inglis in the last match on Rod Laver Arena on Saturday night. However, Osaka […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1658","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1658"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1658\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Australian Open News<\/h2>\n
Naomi Osaka was criticised by Novak Djokovic\u2019s wife over Sorana Cirstea incident<\/h2>\n
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