By Alan Baldwin
LONDON, June 29 (Reuters) – Britain’s former world number four Jack Draper withdrew from Wimbledon due to an arm injury on Monday in a second big blow for the home crowd after Emma Raducanu also pulled out before she could hit a ball.
Draper had to cut short last season with a bone injury in his arm and has been suffering a knee injury this year.
“Devastated to share that I have had to withdraw from my first round match due to a recurrence of my arm injury,” the 24-year-old said in a statement.
“There have been a lot of painful moments in the last 12 months but this one is definitely the absolute worst as there is no greater honour for a British player than playing at Wimbledon.”
Draper, who had been due to play big-serving American world number seven Taylor Fritz in his first round match on Tuesday, was replaced in the draw by Serbian lucky loser Dusan Lajovic.
The Briton had told reporters on Sunday that the number of injuries in men’s tennis was a concern and tournaments would suffer if something was not done about it.
Former U.S. Open champion Raducanu, 23, announced her withdrawal on Sunday as a result of a stress fracture in her lower right leg and Draper’s exit left the draw without Britain’s two biggest names.
The British women’s number one had been scheduled to face Croatia’s Antonia Ruzic on Court One on Monday, a slot that was filled instead by compatriot Harriet Dart against Latvian Jelena Ostapenko.
Early British casualties on the opening day of action were 17-year-old Mika Stojsavljevic, who lost 6-2 6-1 to Swiss 11th seed and 2025 semi-finalist Belinda Bencic, and Max Basing who went out 6-3 6-0 6-0 to Japanese fellow qualifier Shintaro Mochizuki.
Wildcard Felix Gill also went out 6-3 6-3 7-5 to 19-year-old Spanish debutant Rafa Jodar, the 23rd seed.
(Reporting by Alan Baldwin; Editing by Alison Williams)
