KARACHI: When Sania Mirza became the first Indian to win a Women’s Tennis Association event in 2005, the victory marked the beginning of her contributions to several firsts for tennis in the country.
Now, after an illustrious career that has turned Mirza into a symbol of confidence and resilience, the 35-year-old is carving out plans for a future beyond the court, where she hopes to inspire and nurture young talents in the sport she loves. “For me, playing tennis was not about wanting to be famous one day or getting a lot of wealth; it was my love for it that overtook everything else,” Mirza told Arab News in an exclusive interview. “If I’m able to inspire even one girl to pick up a tennis racket, it would mean a lot.” India’s most accomplished woman tennis player said that she has spent the past year setting up her tennis academy in Dubai, after establishing several facilities in her home country.
In the UAE, two chapters are currently up and running, with the newest location, opened earlier this month, located in the Oud Metha area, where many people from the subcontinent reside. “Dubai is my second home, it has been for a long time,” she said, speaking from her UAE house. “Our dream is to try to encourage young boys and girls to not just pick up cricket, but to pick up tennis and actually be good at it.
Who knows, maybe we’ll have a champion from Dubai someday.” As her conversation with Arab News briefly touched on the death of Queen Elizabeth II, Mirza said that the British monarch’s passing felt like “an end of a couple of eras.” “It is definitely sad and I think it was personal on different levels for all of us, for many different reasons.