Serena and Venus Williams bring tennis to Lagos

The sisters are backing a women’s rights organisation campaign Breaking The Mould. During their four-day stay in Lagos, they gave a lecture, attended a fund raising dinner and staged an exhibition tennis match on Wednesday in which Serena played against nine-year-old Lola Holmes, who said the tennis star was her idol.
But beyond the glitz and grandeur attached to their visit, the place of Nigeria in world tennis lies at the bottom of the rung. Nduka Odizor ruled the Nigerian court in the 80s and early 90s rising to world number 52 on ATP ranking in 1984. At the height of his game, he competed for Grand Slam titles in the Australian Open, 1985, French Open, 1986, Wimbledon Open, 1983 and the US Open in 1985 and 1987.
He had seven international career titles won in Monterrey, Dallas, Forest Hills, Tokyo, Sydney, Brisbane and Tel Aviv. He also represented Nigeria at the Seoul Olympics in 1988.
Tony Mmoh was also at the 1988 Olympics but he did not surpass Odizor’s achievement. At the height of his game, he was world number 105 in 1987.
Sadiq Abdullahi reached world number 262 on world ranking in 1985 and was also at the 1988 Olympics, but he had no landmark achievement in the game. Yet, these are the biggest players Nigeria can make reference to as tennis began to die gradually in the 90s. Today, there is no known tennis star of international repute in Nigeria, making the Williams sisters visit timely.
“We’re here to empower young girls and let them know that if you dare to dream, you can achieve any goal you want to,” said Serena on arrival in the country.
The organisers said the initiative was aimed at encouraging more women to break moulds that stood between them and their potential. They calculated that more than 80 million women are in Nigeria but they are constantly held back from realising their dreams because of gender difference.
Giving account of their rise to stardom, Serena said she and her sister fought the colour disparity in the game, highlighting the importance of their visit to Nigeria.
“We were able to break the mould when tennis was very dominated by white people. To have a face of colour come in and dominate showed it doesn’t matter what your background is and where you come from, if you have dreams and goals, that’s all that matters,” Serena said.
The coming of the tennis stars this week was actually not the first time they would be coming to Lagos. In 1998 when they were still struggling to be recognised, the sisters had a stopover in Lagos.
“We looked out the window and we were like, we finally made it to Africa. We definitely would love to see more athletes come out of Africa,” Serena added.
The sisters were drawn in an exhibition on Friday marking their final activity before departure.
Between them, there are 22 major singles titles with 31 year old Serena having won $41.7m in prize money. Off the court, Serena is an undergraduate student at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and she is also involved in modelling and charity works. 32-year-old Venus has won 44 career titles, winning $28.4m in prize money.