Victoria Azarenka said it “wasn’t fair” that she was booed at Wimbledon after her loss to Ukrainian rival Elina Svitolina.

Azarenka, who’s from Belarus, had just lost a third-set tiebreaker on Sunday and – knowing that Svitolina does not shake hands with Russian and Belarusian players after matches in protest of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – walked directly to the umpire to shake hands.

The two-time grand slam champion also seemed to give a slight wave to Svitolina, who won 2-6 6-4 7-6 (11-9).

But as she gathered her equipment and began walking off No.1 Court – where the crowd had been rooting for Svitolina – boos rained down.

“I can’t control the crowd,” she said afterwards. “I’m not sure that a lot of people were understanding what’s happening. It’s probably been a lot of Pimm’s throughout the day. It wasn’t fair. What can I do?

It wasn’t clear if fans thought Azarenka snubbed Svitolina. But the Belarusian shook her head as she walked off and banged her hands or fists together over her head.

At the French Open, it was the other way around for Ukrainian players. Marta Kostyuk was booed when she didn’t shake hands at the net with Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus. Svitolina said she was also booed in Paris.

“For me personally, I think the tennis organisations, they have to come out with a statement that there will be no handshake between Russian, Belarusian, and Ukrainian players,” Svitolina said.

“I don’t know if it’s maybe not clear for people. Some people not really know what is happening. So I think this is the right way to do.”

The 33-year-old Azarenka, who moved from Belarus to the US as a teenager, said she’s always had a good relationship with Svitolina.

“But what can I say about the crowd? There is nothing to say,” Azarenka said.

“She doesn’t want to shake hands with Russian, Belarusian people. I respected her decision. What should I have done? Stayed and waited? Like, I mean, there’s no thing that I could do that would have been right, so I just did what I thought was respectful towards her decision.”

Delays for Djokovic

Novak Djokovic will have to cancel his day off and work overtime to book his spot in the quarter-finals against Andrey Rublev after falling foul of Wimbledon’s stubborn scheduling.

The defending champion and title favourite was leading by two sets, 7-6 (8-6) 7-6 (8-6), against Poland’s Hubert Hurkacz when play was suspended at 10.35pm local time on Sunday.

Wimbledon chiefs will again be under scrutiny for their insistence on starting play no earlier than 1.30pm on Centre Court despite knowing it cannot go past the council-imposed 11pm curfew.

The 36-year-old, seven-time champion Djokovic is trying to achieve all sorts of milestones during this fortnight. In addition to trying to equal Roger Federer’s men’s records for most Wimbledon championships in a row in the Open era (also shared with Bjorn Borg) and most in a career (Martina Navratilova won nine women’s trophies for the overall mark), Djokovic also can collect a 24th grand slam title.

Rublev’s diving skills, meantime, are becoming a theme at this year’s tournament after another spectacular flight across the lawns during his fourth-round win.

The 25-year-old set up match point in a five-set thriller against Alexander Bublik with a gravity-defying lunge to somehow return a backhand piledriver by his mercurial opponent.

Kazakh Bublik stood in stunned disbelief as Rublev somehow redirected the ball back into an open court – a point he said he will remember forever, especially coming on Centre Court, and one destined to be seen as one of Wimbledon’s greatest.

One point later it was all over as Rublev reached the quarters of a grand slam for the eighth time.

Rublev had pulled off another point-winning dive in his previous match against David Goffin and at this rate he could have a show reel to take home after the tournament.

“To make this shot, I don’t know how many times in a life you will have those moments. It’s one of the highlight of my life,” Rublev said when asked about the shot after his 7-5 6-3 6-7 (6-8) 6-7 (5-7) 6-4 victory.

-with AAP