Two-time Grand Slam champion Simona Halep announced her retirement from tennis at age 33 after a first-round loss at a tournament in her home country of Romania on Tuesday, ending an injury-filled comeback from a doping suspension.
Simona Halep announces her retirement at age 33 after 2 Grand Slam titles and a return from a ban
Two-time Grand Slam champion Simona Halep announced her retirement from tennis at age 33 after a first-round loss at a tournament in her home country of Romania on Tuesday, ending an injury-filled comeback from a doping suspension.
Halep used a microphone to address the crowd in Cluj-napoca, Romania, following her 6-1, 6-1 loss to Lucia Bronzetti in the Transylvania Open.
That was the first match of the year for Halep, who reached No. 1 in the WTA rankings for the first time in 2017 but is now 870th and was given a wild-card invitation to play in Romania.
She had pulled out of qualifying for the Australian Open and a tuneup tournament in Auckland, New Zealand, last month because of pain in her knee and shoulder, the latest interruption of her career.