A devastating Russian aerial attack on Ukraine’s Black Sea port city of Odesa has reduced the family apartment of top Ukrainian professional tennis player Dayana Yastremska to rubble, marking the latest incident of Russian strikes destroying Ukrainian athletes’ residential properties amid the ongoing full-scale invasion. In a series of emotional social media posts shared over the weekend, the 26-year-old athlete condemned the attack, pointing to the destruction as a stark example of what Russia’s so-called “Russian world” ideology brings to Ukrainian communities.
Yastremska confirmed that the residential building was struck directly by a Russian Kalibr cruise missile, accompanying her announcement with raw photos showing the multi-story building engulfed in flames after the impact. Amid the charred rubble and collapsed structural remains, the athlete documented one unexpected surviving item: an official orange clay-court towel from the 2025 Roland Garros Grand Slam tournament in Paris, left hanging intact amid the destruction.
Calling the survival of the tennis towel eerily symbolic, Yastremska wrote on her official Instagram account Saturday: “A Russian missile destroyed our apartment in Odesa… SYMBOLIC. A piece of world tennis survived a Russian missile. Our home did not.” She also called on the two global governing bodies of professional tennis—the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) and International Tennis Federation (ITF)—to see the damage through the eyes of Ukrainian athletes, writing: “@wta @itf_reviews Look at these images through our eyes.”
Regional officials confirmed the human cost of the coordinated overnight strike that hit Odesa and the nearby coastal town of Chornomorsk Friday. Odesa regional governor Oleh Kiper reported that 37 people were injured in the attack, including an infant, while two additional residents remain unaccounted for as of Saturday.
This attack is not an isolated incident for Ukrainian athletes. Since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, multiple Ukrainian sports figures have seen their residential properties damaged or destroyed in Russian missile and drone strikes. Last year, for example, Heorhiy Sudakov, a star midfielder for Ukraine’s national men’s football team, reported that his Kyiv apartment was heavily damaged in a Russian drone attack while his wife and young child were inside the home at the time.
Currently ranked 113th in the WTA women’s singles world rankings, Yastremska is one of Ukraine’s most successful active tennis players, most recently advancing to the semifinal round of the 2024 Australian Open. She most recently competed at the 2026 US Open in New York earlier this month, where she was eliminated in the tournament’s first round.