Naomi Osaka retires from Australian Open match with injury NBC Bay Area [Video]

Two-time Australian Open champion Naomi Osaka stopped playing because of a strained abdominal muscle after dropping the opening set of her third-round match against Belinda Bencic on Friday.

“I kind of have a history of it, since I was a teenager. At least once a year, I’d get an ab strain. For me, I want to say it’s more the way my serve is — it’s quite explosive,” Osaka said, explaining that she got hurt at a tournament in Beijing, where she retired from a match against Coco Gauff on Oct. 1. “Unfortunately, it carried on over to the beginning of this season.”

This was Osaka’s first run to the third round at a major tournament since 2022. She missed time in recent seasons because of mental-health breaks.

She also took time off the tour while pregnant. Her daughter, Shai, was born in July 2023.

Osaka began 2025 by making it to the final of a tournament at Auckland, New Zealand, on …