Last updated on May 18th, 2017 at 11:06 pm
Last June, five-time Grand Slam champion Maria Sharapova was banned from after testing positive for the banned drug, meldonium during the Australian Open. Despite being banned from professional tennis tournaments until January 26, 2018, she was able to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport which has always been sympathetic to tennis players in the past for accidently or unknowingly use banned substances.
Last month, Sharapova returned to tennis after a 15 month suspension and was hoping to participate at the French Open as a Wild card.
Unfortunately for Sharapova and her fans, French Tennis Federation president, Bernard Giudicelli announced on Facebook live today that she will not be given a wild card. The decision not to give her a Wild Car was because he felt that it is his responsibility and mission to “protect the game and protect the high standards of the game.”
In short, giving a Wild Card to a player is because he or she is returning to the game of tennis after an injury and not because of a doing suspension.
Sharapova had been given a wild card for her first two tournaments which enabled her to get her tennis world ranking to outside the top 200 this week.
However, it was still not enough to make the qualifying cut for the French Open which will be held this year on May 28 at Roland Garros.
This will be the second straight time that she will miss the French open but sports betting software websites and pay per head companies expect her to make the US Open despite having receiving an injury to her high today during her match against Mirjana Lucic-Baroni in the first round.
This leaves Sharapova with a 310 ranking points placing her no. 171 in the world. This is not good enough to get into Wimbledon and it is unlikely that the All England Club will give her a wild card into the main draw because of the announcement from Mr. Giudicelli.
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