A mere conversation has led to the WTA going to North Africa for only the second time in the history of the WTA calendar. This move is inspired by modest Tunisian tennis star Ons Jabeur, who refuses to take credit for this major move for African Tennis.
Jabeur’s incredible performances, that have seen her rise to 2nd in the world rankings right now, attracted the attention of IMG’s Vickie Gunnarsson and paved the way for the Jasmin Open.
After Jabeur came in as a replacement for Emma Raducanu at the exhibition event in Abu Dhabi at the Mubadala World Tennis Championship (MWTC), Gunnarsson was wowed not only by Jabeur’s amazing talent, but also her incredible charm with the kids during the clinics and autograph sessions she took part in.
“It was actually after Ons Jabeur came to Abu Dhabi last year and I chatted with her. I asked her, ‘You’re Tunisian and tennis seems to be booming there. You’re also a great role model, do you think Tunisia would be interested in hosting a WTA 250 event? It was a wild chance, right?
“She said, ‘Actually, yes, tennis is huge in Tunisia now and it’s growing, so let’s give it a shot’. So she introduced me to Salma (Mouelhi-Guizani), the president of the Tunisian Tennis Federation, and we started talking and Salma was like, ‘Yes, we want to do this’.”
That sparked a conversation between the Tunisian and Gunnarsson, who’s also the tournament director of the MWTC. This conversation led to the establishment of the Jasmin Open. The interest in tennis in Tunisia, North Africa and the Arab world has shot through the roof over the past couple of seasons, thanks to Jabeur’s history-making feats that saw her reach back-to-back finals at Wimbledon and the US Open this year, becoming the highest-ranked Arab player and African woman in history.
The popular world No.2 is the main attraction in Monastir with the inaugural Jasmin Open set to end on the 9th of October. As she finally gets a chance to play in front of her native fans, she kicked off her campaign against the tricky Ann Li with a 6-2 6-3 victory on Tuesday, 4 October.
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