SEIZING OPPORTUNITY

The foundations for the proli c careers of Venus and Serena Williams are woven into tennis folklore. Their father, Richard, had famously watched Virginia Ruzici claim the Roland Garros 1978 women’s title and pocket more than $20,000 in prize money. Identifying a chance for his future o spring to accumulate similar riches, the plan that Richard subsequently wrote for their potential tennis journey was said to span 85 pages.

The sisters became the ultimate example of professional players who created their own opportunities.

Starting on the public courts of Compton in Los Angeles, when they were coached by Richard and their mother Oracene, Venus and Serena bypassed more conventional development routes to become world No.1s and Grand Slam champions.

“Everyone does di erent things,” Serena once commented of the unorthodox pathway, which took in time at a prestigious tennis academy in Florida, a return to their parents’ mentorships, and stellar junior careers that were abandoned so the sisters could focus on education. “I think for Venus and I, we just attempted a di erent road, and it worked for us.”

The sisters’ journey shows there can be many entry points to the game’s upper echelons; for the most resourceful and determined athletes, maximising opportunities starts with identifying them. Here are the ways that some of today’s stars have climbed to professional glory …

The Trailblazer Path

When Ons Jabeur voiced her Grand Slam-winning ambitions as a six-year-old in Tunisia, many people simply laughed. While her mother, Samira, was a passionate recreational player, the tennis club in Jabeur’s hometown of Sousse didn’t even have its own courts. A younger Ons instead trained at nearby hotels.

But fuelled by the support of her mother, who tirelessly drove her to tournaments throughout the northern African nation,

Jabeur moved to the capital, Tunis, at age 12 to train at a national sports high school.

“It was a big decision, it was very hard, but I had to take it, I had to go practise more and more,”

Jabeur told GQ Magazine in 2020.

“(I) stayed with girls I don’t even know from di erent sports at this sports academy.”

The determined teenager also spent time training in France and Belgium and when she claimed the Roland Garros 2011 girls’ singles title, it became the rst of many records for the increasingly popular Jabeur.

The 28-year-old has famously gone on to achieve a series of breakthroughs for Arabic players. She was the first to reach Grand Slam singles finals (Wimbledon and the US Open in 2022) and rise to world No.2 heights. While the ambitious Jabeur works hard to add to those achievements, she proudly recognises the role she can play in the tennis journey of other players. “I see how important I am for African tennis. And when I go to Arab countries I see Arabs how they react to me, and obviously Tunisia as well,” she commented at Wimbledon last year. “Seeing young kids, how I can inspire them, for me it’s not a heavy weight, it’s an unbelievable privilege.”

FROM HUMBLE BEGINNINGS …

Frances Tiafoe doesn’t shy from the against-the-odds nature of his rise to professional tennis heights. A humble start in the sport – when his Sierra Leoneborn father, Frances Snr, was a custodian at a Maryland tennis centre where Frances and his twin brother Franklin regularly slept overnight in a spare o ce – was initially part of a more conservative plan to gain an otherwise una ordable education.

“Once we got in the game of tennis, my dad was like, ‘it would be awesome if you guys can use this as a full scholarship to school’,” Tiafoe explained in New York last year. “I mean, we couldn’t afford a university. So (he urged us to) use the game of tennis.”

The world No.14 American has of course gone on to achieve much more than that, peaking with a career-best Grand Slam campaign at the 2022 US Open,