Chris Evert shown support by Maria Sakkari and Ajla Tomljanovic amid second battle with cancer: "Those beautiful smiles"

Former world number one Chris Evert has thanked Greece’s Maria Sakkari and Australia’s Ajla Tomljanovic for showing support in her ongoing battle with cancer.

The 69-year-old has recently announced that she is once again dealing with her cancer has relapsed after the recent scans and will not be able to take part in ESPN’s transmission of the Australian Open.

Evert, in her latest post on social media platform X — previously known as Twitter — thanked Sakkari and Tomljanovic for support in her ongoing battle with the illness.

The Florida-born is often regarded as one of the greatest players in the history of tennis in the women’s singles category in the Open era, having won as many as 18 Grand Slam titles in her career.

Her most successful competition was Wimbledon where she lifted the title seven times —1974, 1975, 1979, 1980, 1983, 1985 and 1986. Her last major title also came in London where she defeated fellow American and the former world number one Martina Navratilova with a score of 2–6, 6–3, 6–3.

Other than that, Evert also won three doubles Grand Slam titles. She won four Tour Finals in her illustrious career as well — in 1972, 1973, 1975 and 1977.