I love that you asked about restaurants. It made my heart swell to see her dining at Donia when she was in London. Donia's owner Florence Mae Maglanoc is only about a decade older than Alex Eala and is killing it in her field too
It's not her fault that she comes from a wealthy background but absolutely it helps for a young person getting started in tennis e.g., compared to basketball where there is a whole system for identifying and bringing up people with talent most of whom do not come from wealthy backgrounds. So "the ball doesn't know who your parents are" is true and she has every right to make that comment, but it's obviously a lot more complicated than that.
That said, she comes across as a delightful person who is handling a high-pressure situation gracefully and who clearly has genuine tennis talent.
On the money thing, I’m just asking questions: Is the issue that we don’t think the children of the well-off have earned it? Or are we just lamenting that it isn’t easier for the poor to become great tennis players? And how do we categorize those who weren’t rich like Sharapova but got taken on at an academy? Or others who weren’t rich but had some benefactor funding them? A lot of players didn’t grow up wealthy but got support from wealthy people. Is that an unfair advantage?
Of course they have earned it. It's just that you have to have some way to pay for those years of coaching and life on the tour before you can make it financially and it is part of a player's backstory how they pulled it off.
I did a rough calculation for the UK. I reckon it would cost £20,000 ($28,000) to get a junior from age 5 to the point the LTA or other benefactor would deem them high potential enough to consider funding them.
That’s an amount of money that’s out of reach of most of the population.
And that ignores logistics issues around getting the player to tournaments etc etc
I’m lamenting that it is (and I’m mostly basing this on British tennis) incredibly unlikely that anyone not from a privileged background would get even close to professional standard.
No shade on the players that do make it - they still had to work incredibly hard to get there. But…your chance of making it increases exponentially if your dad was head of the LTA (for example).
The parent money thing is a big for me. I’d love to know how many of the top 100 men and women came from a background where a parent couldn’t fun private coaching from an early age.
I’d guess it’s single digits. For sure the British players comes from verging degrees of comfort. Imagine how many great players we miss because the sport is so inaccessible.
As I said then she’s getting more attention than her skill warrants. Now, if she should win Washington, or just get to the semis, then I will be quiet.
I love that you asked about restaurants. It made my heart swell to see her dining at Donia when she was in London. Donia's owner Florence Mae Maglanoc is only about a decade older than Alex Eala and is killing it in her field too
It's not her fault that she comes from a wealthy background but absolutely it helps for a young person getting started in tennis e.g., compared to basketball where there is a whole system for identifying and bringing up people with talent most of whom do not come from wealthy backgrounds. So "the ball doesn't know who your parents are" is true and she has every right to make that comment, but it's obviously a lot more complicated than that.
That said, she comes across as a delightful person who is handling a high-pressure situation gracefully and who clearly has genuine tennis talent.
On the money thing, I’m just asking questions: Is the issue that we don’t think the children of the well-off have earned it? Or are we just lamenting that it isn’t easier for the poor to become great tennis players? And how do we categorize those who weren’t rich like Sharapova but got taken on at an academy? Or others who weren’t rich but had some benefactor funding them? A lot of players didn’t grow up wealthy but got support from wealthy people. Is that an unfair advantage?
Of course they have earned it. It's just that you have to have some way to pay for those years of coaching and life on the tour before you can make it financially and it is part of a player's backstory how they pulled it off.
I did a rough calculation for the UK. I reckon it would cost £20,000 ($28,000) to get a junior from age 5 to the point the LTA or other benefactor would deem them high potential enough to consider funding them.
That’s an amount of money that’s out of reach of most of the population.
And that ignores logistics issues around getting the player to tournaments etc etc
I’m lamenting that it is (and I’m mostly basing this on British tennis) incredibly unlikely that anyone not from a privileged background would get even close to professional standard.
No shade on the players that do make it - they still had to work incredibly hard to get there. But…your chance of making it increases exponentially if your dad was head of the LTA (for example).
The parent money thing is a big for me. I’d love to know how many of the top 100 men and women came from a background where a parent couldn’t fun private coaching from an early age.
I’d guess it’s single digits. For sure the British players comes from verging degrees of comfort. Imagine how many great players we miss because the sport is so inaccessible.
Tiafoe. Only one I could name.
As I said then she’s getting more attention than her skill warrants. Now, if she should win Washington, or just get to the semis, then I will be quiet.
Anyone bringing huge number of new fans to tennis warrants attention in my book