Investment In Grassroots Sports

If you want to see how well investment into grassroots sports is going, you only need to look as far back as the Olympics in Tokyo. The tennis, which covered men’s and women’s singles, doubles and mixed doubles, are prime examples of how effectively used funding comes to fruition further down the line.

Alexander Zverev and Belinda Bencic, who won the men's and women's singles events at Tokyo 2020, enjoyed fantastic junior careers before becoming professionals. They both held the rank of being the number one junior on the planet in their respective fields, and none of this would have been possible without investment into the sport at the grassroots level.

So, you could suggest that if recent times' successes are to continue, investment needs to follow the same path. In the main, a lot of money injected into tennis comes from respective governments and outside investors. Entain, who owns one of the top Canadian casino sites, is a prime example of the latter.

Entain has invested over one million pounds into sports at the grassroots level so far, following the launch of a campaign in 2020. Like other companies worldwide, they want to do their bit in securing the future of sports such as tennis. And, the money they have pumped in during the last months is a testament to this. Entain are no strangers to tennis either, having operated the GVC Global Foundation Eastern European Championship under their former guise last summer.

Now, you may be wondering which players will be next in line to make it at the Olympics or as professionals, thanks to the investment made into tennis. At the time of writing, junior tennis is stronger than it has been for a long time. And it’s the USA and France populating the rankings for the most part.

While China’s Juncheng Shang currently occupies the top spot in the official junior rankings, with 2359 points from the thirty-four events he's entered, the USA and France have three entries apiece in the top ten. The former's Samir Banerjee is Shang's closest rival in second place.

Banerjee, Bruno Kuzuhara and Victor Lilov represent the USA in the world junior rankings, with over 120 events entered between them and a combined points total exceeding the 5,000 mark. They will all become professionals, and they could all make appearances at events such as the Olympics in the future.

France, another country that benefits from investment into tennis at the grassroots level, has prospects such as Luca Van Assche, Arthur Fils, and Giovani Mpetshi Perricard performing well in the top ten junior-level rankings.

They, like many others, have got to where they are and have the careers they will undoubtedly have because of the money coming into the sport lower down. And, if Entain and others continue to retain an interest in supporting grassroots, tennis players and the sport will reap the rewards for years to come.