'We'll Never Know The Truth': Sabalenka Comments About Swiatek's Doping Case Again
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Aryna Sabalenka was asked about Iga Swiatek's doping case for a second time, and she chose her words carefully.
Sabalenka and Swiatek's rivalry will be one of the most fascinating factors to watch during the 2025 season. They have been the best WTA players during the past two seasons and had epic battles for the year-end No. 1 ranking in 2023 and 2024.
Swiatek trailed her rival in the rankings before the 2023 WTA Finals but dramatically overtook the Belarusian by winning the season-ending tournament, including beating Sabalenka in the semifinal.
Sabalenka avenged that brutal moment this year. She was at No. 3 behind Swiatek and Coco Gauff after Wimbledon. However, an outstanding end to the season, including securing a maiden US Open title, saw the 26-year-old finish as the year-end No. 1.
Although Sabalenka deserves massive credit for the run of results she put together to overtake Swiatek, she also benefited from the four-time French Open champion missing the entire Asian swing, citing personal reasons at the time.
Swiatek's fellow players only discovered on November 28th that she was serving a provisional suspension during the Asian swing after testing positive for the banned substance trimetazidine from an out-of-competition sample submitted in August.
The five-time Grand Slam winner's provisional ban was lifted on October 4th, 22 days after it was implemented. Further testing proved her explanation that melatonin tablets she bought had been contaminated with trimetazidine.
Swiatek accepted a one-month suspension, most of which had already been served provisionally. That means the world No. 2 can freely return to the WTA Tour to compete at the opening tournament of the season at the United Cup.
The Pole's first appearance at an event since the doping case became public was at the World Tennis League, an off-season exhibition held in Abu Dhabi. It included Swiatek and Sabalenka competing against each other in a doubles match.
Sabalenka and Mirra Andreeva comfortably beat Swiatek and Badosa at the WTL. Fans noticed that Swiatek and Sabalenka shared a friendly hug at the net afterward, indicating no animosity between them.
In an interview after that match, Sabalenka was asked about Swiatek's doping case for the first time. The Belarusian made it clear she cared about tennis being clean but also said many react to doping cases without knowing all the facts.
Sabalenka has already flown to Australia ahead of her first tournament of the 2025 season at the Brisbane International. During an interview with Tennis Australia, she was again asked about Swiatek's case.
The world No. 1 thinks the truth about the case will never be known and does not want to join others who she thinks overreacted when the news became public.
"We’ll never know the truth. People used to overreact at the first moment the big news come out so I feel like I don’t want to dig too deep into the case. I really believe in a clean sport so I don’t want to comment on that anyhow else."
Although Sabalenka was certainly not attacking her rival in that response, Swiatek might argue that the testing done that lifted her provisional suspension means the truth has been proven.
