World No.1 Daniil Medvedev has removed the Russian flag from his Instagram profile, after Russian and Belarusian tennis stars were hit with sanctions by the International Tennis Federation (ITF).
The move was picked up on by social media users, after it was noticed that he dropped the Russian tricolor from his Instagram bio. The flag had previously been seen beside his description as a ‘pro tennis player’, but no longer features on the account which is followed by just over 950,000 people.
The star’s Twitter account did still have the Russian white, blue and red as of Friday afternoon.
Medvedev will now be forced to compete without his nation’s name and flag after the ITF sanctioned Russia and Belarus earlier this week in light of the conflict in Ukraine.
The Russian and Belarusian tennis federations have been suspended “until further notice”, while teams from the two nations will not be able to compete in this year’s Davis Cup and Billie Jean King Cup – where the Russian Tennis Federation are reigning champions in both events.
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The new world No. 1 tennis player Daniil Medvedev of Russia – the first player other than Djokovic, Federer, Nadal, or Murray to get to No. 1 since February 2004 – has deleted the Russian flag from his Instagram profile.