MONTREAL— Former US Open champion Bianca Andreescu withdrew from the upcoming Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati as she deals with a small stress fracture in her back.
Andreescu announced on social media that she became aware of the pain during her opening-round loss at the Citi Open in Washington on July 31.
The 23-year-old Canadian added she also experienced pain in her match against Italian Camila Giorgi at the National Bank Open in Montreal on Tuesday.
“All of this led me to undergo medical examinations and sadly the results have revealed a small stress fracture in my back,” Andreescu wrote on Twitter.
“This unfortunately means that I won’t be able to compete in Cincinnati.
“My main focus will be on giving my back the rest it needs. I’ll be taking things day by day and aiming to return to the court as soon as I can and stay optimistic for the US Open.”
Andreescu won the 2019 US Open and reached as high as No. 4 in the world. She currently is ranked 41st.
Elsewhere, Australia’s Jannik Sinner won the National Bank Open for his first ATP Masters 1000 title, beating Alex de Minaur 6-4, 6-1.
Sinner, the 21-year-old Italian player seeded seventh, has eight tour victories, also winning in February at Montpellier.
He’s the second Italian Masters 1000 champion, following Fabio Fognini in the 2019 event in Monte Carlo.
Sinner broke de Minaur’s serve five times in the 90-minute match.
De Minaur, from Australia, won in March in Acapulco for his seventh tour title.
Alex de Minaur has fallen short in his bid to capture a maiden ATP Masters 1000 title, losing the Canadian Open final in straight sets to his Italian nemesis Jannik Sinner.
It was Sinner’s sixth win from as many meetings with de Minaur and instead earned the 21-year-old his first ATP Masters 1000 crown after losing two Miami Open finals, in 2021 to Hubert Hurkacz and this year to Daniil Medvedev.
The 21-year-old is the youngest Canadian ATP Masters champion since Alexander Zverev won as a 20-year-old in 2017.
Sinner is also only the second Italian to win at this level since 1990, the 2019 Monte Carlo champion Fabio Fognini.
While Sinner will climb to No.6 in the world, de Minaur’s consolation is a new career-high ranking of 12th in a huge confidence booster ahead of the US Open starting in two weeks.
The 24-year-old was contesting his fourth final of the year, after claiming his seventh career title in Acapulco and losing to world No.1 Carlos Alcaraz at Queen’s and to the fourth-ranked Stefanos Tsitsipas two weeks ago in the Los Cabos decider.
But de Minaur was playing catch-up from the get go against his Toronto doubles partner.
He dropped his first service game to trail 2-0, broke back for 2-2 only to be broken again to trail 4-2.
In a pattern, de Minaur again levelled for 4-4 only to drop serve trying to stay in the bizarre set as Sinner took it in 54 minutes.
Sinner gained two more breaks in the second set to run away with the match and land the eighth trophy of his professional career.
