Double Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova has announced that she will retire from tennis at the end of this summer.
The Czech player won the ladies’ singles titles in 2011 and 2014 and also reached the final of the Australian Open in 2019.
In recent years she has fallen down the rankings and last made the quarter-finals of a Grand Slam in 2020.
She missed the whole of 2024 to have her first child and only returned to action in February.
Kvitova said on X that she had surpassed her dreams during her career and will retire after September’s US Open.
She said,: “I never imagined becoming a professional tennis player, being able to travel the world and play in the most beautiful stadiums around the world.
“I’ve been privileged to reach incredible heights over the past 19 years and accomplished more than I could have ever imagined.”
The former world number two was the only non-British player named in the initial batch of Wimbledon wildcards announced on Wednesday.
Kvitova was the first Czech since Jana Novotna in 1998 to win Wimbledon when she beat Maria Sharapova in the 2011 final, and Novotna and former Czech great Martina Navratilova were in the Royal Box to see her win.
