Elena Rybakina will get her Wimbledon title defence underway on Tuesday as she faces Shelby Rogers in her first match at SW19 since being crowned the champion 12 months ago. Now No 3 in the world, Rybakina wasn’t one of the title favourites going into the tournament last year but comes back as one of the top names in women’s tennis. And in her home of Kazakhstan, she is making tennis “as popular as football” after leaving Russia to represent the nation.
A lot was made of Moscow-born Rybakina’s Wimbledon run last year, given that Russians were banned from The Championships. But the 24-year-old switched allegiances to Kazakhstan back in 2018 after turning down an offer from the United States.
The world No 3 said she and the Kazakhstan Tennis Federation found each other at the perfect time. And her decision to move paid off, as the federation’s president explained how Rybakina’s Wimbledon win gave tennis a boost in the country.
“Her triumph at Wimbledon has had a huge impact on Kazakhstan that can still be felt thanks to her success on the tour,” Bulat Utemuratov exclusively told Express Sport. “Our tennis centres are filled with queues of children who want to play tennis.
“Elena gave the younger generation of Kazakhstani players a dream and the belief that anyone in Kazakhstan is capable of winning a Grand Slam tournament. Her results are driving the rapid growth of tennis in the country.”
The Kazakh tennis boss said Rybakina’s success was even starting to put tennis on the same level as football as he added: “I am delighted that we are getting a lot of support from the media and the public for our sport, that the general public is becoming more and more interested in tennis, and that our sport is becoming as popular as football.”
Rybakina isn’t the only Kazakh who has enjoyed success at Wimbledon, with Yaroslava Shvedova winning the women’s doubles title in 2010. Like Rybakina, she also switched allegiances from Russia early in her career.
Discussing her decision to snub the US for Kazakhstan, Rybakina told a small group of reporters: “In that moment I was finishing school and my parents – of course like every other parent – they were worried like if I’m going to make it pro, then you never know if the injury comes.
“And they wanted for me to have good schools and I had very good offers from US which usually you get when you are playing good as a junior. So it was not an easy decision and then of course financially it’s not also easy to stay as a pro and I think everything came together in the moment.
“Kazakhstan federation they were looking for a player, I was looking for some help so we found each other in the perfect moment and this is how I started [my] professional career I would say.”
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