Asia’s wait for its first Grand Slam singles winner goes on.
As Taiwan’s Chan Yung-Jan walked off court after being hammered 6-1, 6-0 by top seed Caroline Wozniacki on Saturday, the continent’s interest in the final Grand Slam of the year dwindled.
Asia’s failure to get a single player into the fourth round of either the men’s or women’s draw at Flushing Meadows is a disappointing outlay bearing in mind the promise shown of late by a growing hotbed of tennis talent.
Asia looked set to break its Grand Slam record at January’s Australian Open when Chinese duo Li Na and Zheng Jie reached the semifinals.
But the rest of 2010 proved disappointing with just three more quarterfinalists in the subsequent Grand Slams, Li and Lu Yen-Hsun of Taiwan at Wimbledon and Kazakhstan’s Yaroslava Shvedova at the French Open.
Asia’s longest-lasting player at the current US Open, Chan Yung-Jan, is not overly concerned about the continent’s poor showing in New York.
“For our country it’s better for us — it’s the best result we’ve ever had,” said the world No. 77. “I know everyone’s out of the tournament from Asia but we are growing all the time and Asian tennis is getting better,” she said.
In all, there are six men in the world’s top 100 but the continent’s male contingent boasts just one Grand Slam quarterfinal spot in the last 15 years courtesy of Lu in London in July.
A first Asian Grand Slam winner looks far likelier to come from the current crop of women, who boast nine players in the top 100, including the 21-year-old Chan .
“You never know who’s going to make the breakthrough and when,” she said. “For the moment, everybody is working hard and you never know what’s going to happen next.”
Reuters
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