Unconventional Li Na’s honesty and humor have made her a shining light at the Australian Open, and a big favorite with fans, but it has not been an easy route to the top.
Unwilling to be shackled by the Chinese sports system, leading to clashes with officialdom and a reputation for being difficult, she’s managed to do it her way and now stands on the brink of a historic Grand Slam win.
Li, who will play Belgian Kim Clijsters in the Australian Open final today, is a converted badminton player who then gave up tennis for two years to study journalism.
Photo: EPA
She defied Chinese convention by getting a tattoo — a red rose — on her chest and employed her husband, Jiang Shan, as coach rather than using those provided by the China Tennis Association.
But now the trailblazing Li is being mentioned in same breath as China’s basketball superstar Yao Ming, and has become a flagbearer for the growing sport of tennis in her homeland.
Li was the first Chinese woman to win a WTA title in Guangzhou in 2004, the first to make a Grand Slam quarter-final at Wimbledon two years later, and the first Chinese player to break into the top 10.
Last year, she and Zheng Jie both reached the Australian Open semi-finals, and this year Li has gone at least one better.
If she beats Clijsters, she’ll become the first Asian player to win a major and could be ranked as high as a career-best fifth in the world after the tournament.
Yet it was a badminton racquet that kicked off Li’s sporting career, with limited success, leading to a switch to tennis — against her will — when she was nine.
“After I played two years, the badminton coach just tell me, ‘you are not so good at playing badminton, because it looks like you should play tennis, so you should change for tennis,’” she recalled. “At the time, tennis was not so popular in China. After my family saw the court, they said, ‘okay, we’ll change.’ I was like, ‘why you didn’t ask me?’”
Frustrated by her inability to reach the main draw of the Grand Slams, Li retired for two years in her early 20s, but a plea to play in a national competition reignited her passion for the game.
“My team just come to the university to ask me if I can help for them, because during the time they didn’t have a good player,” she said.
“I thought if they need me, for sure I should come back for them,” Li said. “So I come back in 2004. I think maybe just best choice for me.”
Her reputation as being difficult with Chinese media is hard to reconcile with her charming and sometimes offbeat press conferences at the Australian Open.
She has openly joked about her love for the financial incentives on offer, saying her reward for big wins was being allowed a credit card spending spree.
When she came back from a set down to beat Caroline Wozniacki in the semis, Li said her motivation was “prize money.”
Asked about hew slow start against Wozniacki, she said it was because her husband kept her awake all night with his snoring, prompting laughter and applause from the crowd.
Currently on an 11-match winning streak, Li said she was a better player than when beaten by Serena Williams in the semis last year.
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