Andrea Petkovic comments on the state of women’s tennis in Germany. The former player sees great potential, but believes it is not being fully exploited.
Andrea Petkovic believes the lack of depth in women’s tennis in Germany is the reason why German players are failing to achieve top results.
“The depth from which four or five players stand out no longer exists,” said the former top 10 player in an interview with Eurosport.
Although there is currently “incredible potential and a lot of talent” in Germany, the necessary depth is no longer there to fully exploit it. According to Petkovic, this means there is no chance that “someone might surprise us and take off.”
Possible top players
However, she believes that Germany’s young players have a lot of potential: There are “lots” of potential top players, such as Eva Lys, Ella Seidel and Jule Niemeier, but the difficulty with individual sports is precisely “that every story is unique”.
Unlike today, when Petkovic was playing, there was a pool of “15 players of a similar age” who “also played well”.
Angelique Kerber, Sabine Lisicki, and Julia Görges, with whom Petkovic enjoyed a successful period in German women’s tennis, were, like herself, merely those “who came through later,” according to the 37-year-old.
At the same time, the level of performance in women’s tennis has generally developed strongly in recent years. At the beginning of her tour in 2008, not “all players in the top 150 were playing at such a high level,” explained the former world number nine. Instead, there was “a big gap” between the top 50 and the rest of the world.
