Tennis Canada has recently released figures showing that the number of young people picking up a tennis racket in Canada has jumped massively in the last few years is record-breaking for the North American nation.
According to the nation’s governing body, more than 160,000 boys and girls under the age of twelve were identified as playing the sport regularly in 2016. Tennis Canada defines regular play as at least once a week over a period of eight weeks. It reflects a massive increase of more than 23% since 2014.
Some of this can be attributed to the impacts of Milos Raonic and Eugenie Bouchard, who have both put Canadian tennis on the world stage by reaching the Top Ten of the ATP and WTA rankings respectively. Bouchard reached a Wimbledon final, the first Canadian to reach a singles grand slam final in the Open Era, whilst Raonic can boast a current Top Five ATP ranking and a grand slam final at Wimbledon last year.
Hatem McDadi, senior vice-president of tennis development for Tennis Canada, “It’s also globally a golden era of tennis with Serena Williams hitting milestones — Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, Andy Murray, Maria Sharapova.”
David Fingold, sponsor of a major juniors tournament run this month in Canada said, “this is really the first time we’ve had players of that quality, and the young people see that. Some of them want to become the next Milos or the next Genie. It’s the same thing as when I was growing up and you wanted to be the next Frank Mahovlich or Rocket Richard.”
McDadi also highlighted the influence of migration on Canada’s tennis growth “They have a strong history with tennis, Europeans, Asians, South Americans,. It’s affordable. It’s accessible. You can start at a young age and play with your family, and there are tremendous health benefits.”
Indeed, Raonic himself could be considered such an individual who has helped Canadian tennis as a migrant. He was born in Podgorica, Montenegro, whilst long-time Canadian doubles specialist Daniel Nestor was born in Belgrade, Serbia.
Even amongst the new generation, there is signs of the migration influence, with Denis Shapovalov, the reigning Wimbledon Junior Champion, was born in Tel Aviv, Israel before moving to Canada before his first birthday. Sixteen year-old Felix Auger-Aliassime looks set to join Vasek Pospisil as one of the first Canadian-born players to make an impact, with the junior already making headlines in junior tournaments, along with eye-catching wins at Futures and Challenger level.
Tennis had long been forced to play second fiddle to more typical North American sports such as basketball, baseball and american football for a number of years. Canada has also always retained a large number of people taking part in winter sports, with ice hockey, skiing, snowboarding, all drawing large numbers. Yet, in seeing tennis figures rise, some of these sports, notably ice hockey, have seen participation figures fall.
Whatever the reasons, it looks as if Canada is embracing tennis, and the nation could soon be competing with long-time rival the United States for tennis honours consistently.
