Omar Laabidi remembers being repeatedly beaten by a 12-year-old Jabeur, who will Thursday become the first Arab to play in a Grand Slam semi-final, at Wimbledon. "We used to call her 'Roger Federer'," Laabidi said.
He was talking at the tennis club where it all began, in the North African country's coastal town of Hammam Sousse. "One time during a training match she hit a drop shot that I tried so hard to return that I broke my arm," he said.
Jabeur had started by playing on courts belonging to local hotels but she soon joined the Tennis Club Hammam Sousse, which now bears a huge portrait of its most famous graduate.
Coach Nabil Mlika recalls training a talented girl "determined to stand out" against both female and male peers. It is a determination that has taken her all the way to the world number two spot -- one place behind Poland's Iga Swiatek.