Top players: China's tennis will soar
- By Zhang Rui
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E-mail China.org.cn, October 12, 2013
Top tennis players Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal both are optimistic about China's tennis game, while they themselves struggled to move forward on course for the Shanghai Rolex Masters final.
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Djokovic returned a shot to Monfils in the quarter-finals of Shanghai Masters. |
"Just looking at the revolution of all sports here in China; it's quite recent," Djokovic said, "Also, football from Europe to China not too many years ago, it may be 15 or 20 years ago that it started to pick up in popularity. Nowadays, it's actually one of the most popular sports around the country. Then [came] basketball. And now we have tennis. "
Djokovic added Serbia, his native country, too did not have a big tennis tradition, just like there is no big tennis tradition in China. Nevertheless, anybody can succeed with strong willpower and desire, the player said.
"It is a process that takes time," he said, "Obviously you can't really expect to have top men's tennis players overnight. But it's obvious that the bigger the amount of tournaments, the more possibilities for the local players to prove themselves and to eventually get a chance to be in the ATP rankings."
"It really helps when you have more tournaments in different categories of professional tennis in such a big country so that you can try to be successful on every level and slowly climb up the ladder," Djokovic added, "Generally it's much better to have the system, an organization in a certain sport, that can help at least in the first steps of a player's development to give him that push towards the professional world."
The world's No. 1 Rafael Nadal spent a lot of time with the Chinese player Wu Di in Shanghai. Talking about Wu, Nadal saw him as a beacon of hope. "He has very good technique. He's a great player. Very good rhythm. Very talented. If you are able to keep improving, he will have the chance to be in the top 100. He has a lot of positive things [going for him]. I will see him in the top 100 on the tour for sure."
Nadal was happy to offer some advice to his Chinese fellow players. "The only piece of advice that I can give you is the one that everybody knows: Practice every day with the right attitude, go on court every day with the goal to improve something."
He also saw the game's popularity rising in China and said, "The people here in China learn more and more about tennis every time because of this tournament. So tennis is becoming very popular. I think they enjoyed the match. It is a positive thing that every year I see more people inside the stadium."
Djokovic, the Shanghai Rolex Masters defending champion, had to work hard to post his 6-7 (4), 6-2, 6-4 quarterfinal win over Gael Monfils, the guy who sent Roger Federer home on Thursday.
Rafael Nadal also struggled to get by Stanislas Wawrinka in an entertaining first set, but then ran away with the second set towards a 7-6 (10), 6-1 quarterfinal victory. Nadal is looking for his first Shanghai Rolex Masters title, which will be his 11th title of the year if he succeeds.
Recovered from a feverish cold earlier in the week, Del Potro spent 76 minutes on court carving out his semifinal slot by executing a 6-3, 6-3 win over Nicolas Almagro of Spain.
Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, who sat out the summer season with a left knee injury, reached his sixth career ATP Masters 1000 semifinal with a 6-2, 6-3 win over Florian Mayer of Germany on Friday.
The Shanghai Rolex Masters will see the final being played on October 13, at Qi Zhong Tennis Center, Shanghai. Guitar legend Andy Summers, former member of rockband The Police, will be performing with his new band Circa Zero after the singles final.
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