Women's tennis – Veterans Back to Centre Court
Women's tennis in the world was dominated by talented teenagers some years ago. However, this is not the case anymore. As Denmark's Caroline Wozniaki was the only teenager who was ranked in the top-25 of the women's game in the French Open that begun on Sunday. Older generation staged a surprise rally so far in this year’s French Open Tournament.
At Roland Garros, the senior citizens are leading the charge this year. A 35-year old American, Jill Craybas and Paraguay's Rossana De Los Rios, both brushed aside opponents over 10 years their junior players to go through the second round. What was most improbable was Dinara Safina being bundled out by old Japanese veteran who ended up hobbling on one leg.
Kimiko Date Krumm, who turns 40 in September, is the second-oldest woman to win a match at the French Open. The period of the teen idol is almost over at an event where the enthusiasm and sportsmanship spirit of the youth used to dominate.
Serena Williams after her first round victory in the French Open viewed that everyone has grown older. 23.3 was the average age of the top-20 players on the women's professional tour about a decade ago. However, the average age this year is 25 years which is pretty much ancient. At the 1987 French Open when Steffi Graf won the first of her six titles she started a run of six years.
In the women's game from the very beginning, there have been teenage sensations. Lottie Dod at the age of 15 became Wimbledon Champion where as Maureen Connolly over a three-year career won every major singles trophy and nine grand-slam titles in the 1950’s. Precocious adolescents kept on emerging after every few years. At the age of 16, Tracy Austin became the youngest known U.S. Open champion ever. While few years later, at the age of 17 Andrea Jaeger reached the final of the French Open Tournament. And apparently endless production line of teen idols popped up and took a strong hold on the women's game in the 1990’s.
Martina Hingis also reached the first grand-slam quarterfinal at a very young age of 15. Maria Sharapova and Venus Williams did it at the age of 17. With the help of synthetic strings and larger-headed rackets, it was easy for the players to hit the ball hard and still keep it in the court. The youngsters were able to hit the ball as powerfully as fully grown women just by working out away from the court and eating right.
Few new rules have kicked some teenagers off the playground. A renewed emphasis has been placed on the game experience and physical maturity due to changes to the WTA Tour. The women's tennis circuit was an endless grind for the world's best players of all times who had started young over the past five years before the new regulations were implemented. The WTA had 26 premier events on top of the four Grand Slams and the annual Fed Cup tournament, out of which half of them were mandatory for top-ranked players. Many opted for retirement in their mid-20s due to a series of far flung Tournaments and forgettable stops.
Hence in this perspective, players were not just winning at a very young age but they were retiring from the game earlier as well. In the list of World Top-20, there was only one player who was over 30 years old about ten years ago. However, cutting the number of mandatory events, restricting the World’s Top-10 players to just 10 tournaments outside the grand slams and limiting the teenagers to fewer matches ended up in a rather surprising way that golden oldies like Ms. Date Krumm are taking rest at home.
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