Belgian Tennis Powerhouse
With the return of Kim Clijsters and Justine Henin, along with the strong play of Yanina Wickmayer, the tiny nation of Belgium is now (again) a tennis powerhouse in women’s tennis. Wickmayer is currently ranked 14th, Clijsters 16th, Henin 33rd and Kirsten Flipkens
ranked 69th, is the other Belgian woman in the top 100. Based on their results at the Sony Ericsson Open, those rankings will change. On the men’s side, Olivier Rochus, ranked 59th, and Xavier Malisse ranked 91st, are the only men in the top 100.
Russia has been the leading country in women’s tennis for many years, dominating the top twenty. China has also produced some strong players such as Na Li and Jie Zheng. However, Belgium is in a another league, given its small size and the number of Grand Slam titles held by Justine Henin, seven, and Kim Clijsters, two. Amazingly, Henin and Clijsters are only a year apart and so they’ve played against each other since they were youngsters. It’s also ironic in a way that both Henin and Clijsters retired early and now have staged comebacks within a year of each other, apparently totally unrelated. The result has been a generous amount of publicity for Henin and Clijsters, Belgium, as well as for women’s tennis.
|
