Osaka withdraws from Berlin event

Naomi Osaka has pulled out of next week's Berlin WTA 500 grass-court event, casting doubt over her participation at Wimbledon this summer.

The four-time Grand Slam winner withdrew from the French Open last week citing struggles depression and social anxiety.

"We have received notification Naomi Osaka cannot start in Berlin. After consulting her management, she will take a break," a spokesman for the Berlin event said Monday, according to BBC Sport.

The German tournament is set to begin on June 14. Wimbledon, the third Grand Slam on the 2021 calendar, starts on June 28 and runs for two weeks.

Osaka, 23, was fined $15,000 and threatened with expulsion for skipping media duties at the French Open after her first-round win over Patricia Maria Tig. She announced before the clay-court event that she wouldn't attend press conferences and hoped fines she'd incur would go to a mental health charity.

"I think now the best thing for the tournament, the other players, and my well-being is that I withdraw so that everyone can get back to focusing on the tennis going on in Paris," Osaka wrote in a statement published last Monday. "I never wanted to be a distraction, and I accept that my timing was not ideal and my message could have been clearer."

She added, "The truth is that I have suffered long bouts of depression since the US Open in 2018, and I have had a really hard time coping with that."