Djokovic, Nadal and Swiatek to play in Paris

Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray are all among the players entered in the men’s tennis tournament at the Paris Olympics, the International Tennis Federation revealed Thursday.

Daniil Medvedev will technically have to compete under a “neutral” banner rather than as a Russian athlete, due to his country’s invasion of Ukraine.

Djokovic (Serbia) and Murray (UK), both 37, and Nadal (Spain), 38, have all won multiple career Grand Slam titles. Djokovic leads the way with 24 major titles, although he has never won Olympic gold.

Nadal, who ranks second with 22 career Grand Slam titles, won singles gold at the 2008 Games and doubles gold at the 2016 Games. He skipped Wimbledon, which is underway, to prepare for the Olympic tournament.

Murray has won three majors in his career and is the only tennis player to win back-to-back singles gold medals at the Summer Olympics. He has already said he plans to retire after the Paris Games, where the tennis tournament will be held from July 27 to August 4 on the clay courts of the French Open.

Among the headliners on the women’s side are world No. 1 Iga Swiatek (Poland), No. 2 Coco Gauff (USA) and No. 4 Elena Rybakina (Kazakhstan). No. 3 Aryna Sabalenka has decided to sit out the Olympics; her country, Belarus, is an ally of Russia in its invasion of Ukraine, so she could have competed as a “neutral” athlete, like Medvedev.

Swiatek has won five Grand Slam titles — including four at the French Open in the last five years — while Gauff and Rybakina have won one major title each. Gauff could have represented the United States at the Tokyo Olympics three years ago, but was left off the team after testing positive for COVID-19.

The singles main draws will each feature 64 players, and the doubles draws will feature 32 teams. The 16 mixed doubles teams will be announced on July 24. The draw for the tournament will take place on July 25 in Paris.

Other players announced Thursday include three-time Grand Slam champion Carlos Alcaraz — who will also play doubles with Nadal — world No. 1 Jannik Sinner (Italy), Tokyo Olympic gold medalist Alexander Zverev (Germany), 2008 Olympic doubles gold medalist Stanislas Wawrinka (Switzerland), four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka (Japan), 2019 U.S. Open champion Bianca Andreescu (Canada) and 2018 Australian Open champion Caroline Wozniacki (Denmark).

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