Dayana Yastremska loses final in Lyon and speaks moving words to Ukraine: “You are so strong”

Dayana Yastremska slung a blue and yellow flag over her shoulders and made a heart with her hands. Then the tennis player turned to her compatriots, who are experiencing such immeasurable suffering.

“When Ukrainians watch me, I want to tell them: you are so strong, you have an incredible spirit,” said the 21-year-old with a shaky voice and tears in her eyes after the final of the WTA tournament in Lyon a week later narrowly lost in their escape from the bombs. Yastremska exclaimed that she tried to fight for her country. “Slava Ukraini” – glory of Ukraine.

On Friday of the previous week she had left Ukraine with her 15-year-old sister Ivanka in a small boat across the Danube. The family had been “woken up by bombs” and initially sought shelter in an underground car park. Her father, who stayed in the country like the mother, drove his children from Odessa about 250 kilometers to Izmail.

Yastremska donates prize money to support Ukraine

After saying goodbye to their parents in tears, the Yastremska sisters made the crossing to Romania. “Mom and Dad, we love you very much, take care of yourselves,” Yastremska wrote on Instagram about the moving pictures.

The impressions of her escape, the destruction she saw along the way, and the pride and bravery of the Ukrainians accompanied her in her mind as she made her strong run in Lyon. Jastremska donated her prize money to a foundation to support her homeland.

(SID)