{"id":440466,"date":"2025-09-21T08:07:26","date_gmt":"2025-09-21T08:07:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/440466\/"},"modified":"2025-09-21T08:07:26","modified_gmt":"2025-09-21T08:07:26","slug":"tough-times-in-wagga-wagga-as-young-tennis-stars-chase-grand-slam-dreams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/440466\/","title":{"rendered":"Tough times in Wagga Wagga as young tennis stars chase grand slam dreams"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Cara Korhonen walked onto Rod Laver Arena at the age of 10 to have a hit with one of her tennis heroes, it sparked a dream that has taken her all over the world.<\/p>\n

“I had Alicia Molik playing right next to me and she gave me a high-five,”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

the now 19-year-old said.<\/p>\n

“[She] was telling me how well I was playing and that’s a memory that has really stuck with me.”<\/p>\n

\"Woman<\/p>\n

Cara Korhonen has been playing tennis since she was 4 years old. (ABC Riverina: Jess Scully)<\/p>\n

The Gold Coaster is number 1,463 on the Women’s Tennis Association rankings and has been playing since she first picked up a racquet at age four.<\/p>\n

Her dream of grand slam stardom has taken her to Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, the US, Finland \u2014 and Wagga Wagga.<\/p>\n

Playing for love, not money<\/p>\n

Competitors in the Women’s 35 ITF World Tennis Tournament at Wagga Wagga are slugging it out for a share of $30,000 in prize money.<\/p>\n

By comparison, the Australian Open offers a prize pool of more than $33 million across the men’s and women’s singles divisions and another $5 million for doubles.<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/p>\n

Players at Wagga Wagga’s world tour tennis event are competing for a prize pool of $30,000. (Supplied: Tennis NSW)<\/p>\n

But for players like Korhonen, the real prize on offer at Wagga is ranking points.<\/p>\n

“Trying to get as many points as possible so it’s much surer getting into these tournaments,” she said.<\/p>\n

“A lot of what I’m doing has to be on my own.”<\/p>\n

That means she has to be as quick to spot a bargain as she is across the court.<\/p>\n

“[I] go to Coles or Woollies and look at those quick sale items and just try and pick up any of those as much as possible,”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

she said.Mum along for the ride<\/p>\n

Korhonen’s mother Annelie has taken on the role of coach and support crew.<\/p>\n

“Every single tournament you’re more likely to be a couple thousand [dollars] out of pocket,” she said.<\/p>\n

“A first round on the main draw, that pays you about two nights’ accommodation.<\/p>\n

“It’s always you go home more or less on a minus, you’ve paid more than what you got back.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Aspiring tennis star Cara Korhonen (left) with her mother Annelie at Wagga Wagga’s world tour event. (ABC Riverina: Jess Scully)<\/p>\n

Gabriella Da Silva-Fick has been playing tennis for 15 years and is number 515 in the WTA singles rankings.<\/p>\n

“People see those bigger tournaments and think it’s all glamorous, but there’s a lot of work that goes into it,” she said.<\/p>\n

“We book pretty much all our own accommodation, travel, flights. It’s pretty much all out of our bank accounts, so there is a lot of pressure on results.”<\/p>\n

The Collaroy local has competed in Europe and played in the Australian Open in 2019.<\/p>\n

“What people don’t realise is if we’re sick or we’re injured, we’re not getting paid, so it’s up to us to take care of our bodies,”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Da Silva-Fick said.\"Woman<\/p>\n

Australian tennis player Gabriella Da Silva-Fick is chasing her dreams at Wagga Wagga’s world tour event.\u00a0 (Supplied: Tennis NSW)<\/p>\n

Korhonen at least has a secret weapon when it comes to dealing with the mental stress of chasing her dreams of sporting stardom.<\/p>\n

“I’m about to finish [a psychology] degree. I’ve done that in under a year and a half,” she said.<\/p>\n

“Stepping out onto the courts at the Australian Open and being addressed as Dr Korhonen, that has always been a big dream of mine.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Cara Korhonen walked onto Rod Laver Arena at the age of 10 to have a hit with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":440467,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4105],"tags":[149049,149050,1232,79,3165,1068,16,15,149048],"class_list":{"0":"post-440466","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-cara-korhonen","9":"tag-gabriella-da-silva-fick","10":"tag-money","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-struggle","13":"tag-tennis","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-w35-wagga-world-tennis-tournament"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115241264494313788","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=440466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440466\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/440467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}