Li Na’s achievement in claiming one of sport’s major international prizes has been rightly lauded, but precedent suggests her Roland Garros triumph does not necessarily mark the birth of China as a tennis power.
Li’s French Open triumph was widely described as granting her entry to the “pantheon” of modern Chinese sporting greats alongside the country’s most popular sportsmen — NBA player Yao Ming and Olympic champion high hurdler Liu Xiang.
“This win is truly a breakthrough in a sport that has been dominated mainly by players from Europe, Australia and the Americas,” China Tennis Association chief Sun Jinfang said. “It is a massive source of pride for all the Asians and it can serve as a great milestone for the development of Chinese tennis.”
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Yao’s arrival in the NBA in 2002 and Liu’s stunning gold medal run at the 2004 Athens Olympics were also major breakthroughs for China, but the fact remains that few of their compatriots have been able to follow the trails they blazed.
Every sport that pitches up in China attracted by lure of the world’s fastest-growing major economy, and there are few that have not, declares it is looking for its own Yao Ming to fire local interest.
While Yao has proved remarkably effective for the NBA in marketing terms — China is their biggest market outside North America — his nine years at the Houston Rockets have not inspired an army of talented Chinese in the world’s best league.
Pioneers Menk Bateer and Wang Zhizhi are now back in China after getting a small amount of time on US courts, while Yi Jianlian has started 163 games for three teams in four years and Sun Yue played 10 games for the Los Angeles Lakers, before returning to China.
Liu appears to have had even less impact since that balmy Athens evening seven years ago when he became the first Asian man to win an Olympic track event, proving, in his own words, that “the yellow man can sprint.”
After injury dramatically robbed him of the chance to defend his 110m hurdles title on home soil at the 2008 Beijing Games, China failed to win any gold medals in track and field.
Like Yao, Liu has been bedeviled by injury in recent years, but the 27-year-old will still be China’s only realistic hope of a title on the track at this year’s world athletics championships in South Korea.
The table-topping performance at the Beijing Olympics proved China’s sports system is remarkably successful at producing champions in more marginal sports, as well as those such as table tennis and badminton where they have long ruled the roost.
Developing top talent in more popular sports, where rewards are higher and the international quality runs much deeper, has proved more difficult for a system where the emphasis remains on early identification and years of regimented intensive training.
In golf, Zhang Lianwei’s breakthrough European Tour win in 2003 was followed by Liang Wenchong’s similar feat in 2007, but they are now 46 and 32-years-old respectively and there are no Chinese players in the top 100 in the world rankings.
In soccer, the promise of the years near the turn of the century when the likes of Sun Jihai and Fan Zhiyi played at the top level in England have long since faded.
Today, Hao Junmin is probably the country’s highest-profile soccer export having played a handful of games in the German Bundesliga for Schalke 04 last season.
There are currently just four Chinese among the top 100 women’s tennis players in the world and 12 in the top 500, compared with 16 and 46 for Russia and six and 24 for France.
Much has been made of Li’s breaking away from the state system in 2009 along with Wimbledon and Australian Open semi-finalist Zheng Jie, Grand Slam doubles champion Yan Zi and Peng Shuai, now ranked in the worlds top 20.
Although the success of the “flyaway” system may influence discussions on future sports policy in China, the fact is that no player since the original quartet has felt comfortable enough to leave the embrace of the system.
The lack of strength in depth in Chinese women’s tennis is certainly not a reflection of a lack of interest or investment on the part of the international women’s professional tour.
The WTA have clearly identified China as a major part of their future strategy, awarding Beijing one of their four “Crown Jewel” tournaments and relocating their Asia-Pacific headquarters to Beijing.
They have been heavily involved in attempting to broaden the playing base of tennis in a country where an overriding emphasis on education means few children play sport for fun and the state sports system is obsessed with success at the Olympics, which offer a paltry two-and-a-half gold medals in women’s tennis.
The WTA and China Tennis Association may yet succeed and Li’s success is bound to inspire more than a few children among China’s 1.3 billion people to pick up a racket.
However, impressive as the 29-year-old’s feat was, there is every possibility that this year’s French Open could mark the pinnacle of Chinese success in women’s tennis for the foreseeable future.
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