ITF

A role for home-grown heroes Yet amid the obstacles, there are some bright lights, notably the players who make it from the Caribbean onto the full professional tour and can then serve as unofficial ambassadors for the areas in which they grew up. Players like Mark Knowles from the Bahamas, Ronald Agenor from Haiti, Darian King from Barbados, and Victor Estrella Burgos from the Dominican Republic – all have heightened the public awareness of tennis in their home states and have an ongoing role to play after their playing days are over. "It's very important that the players go back to their country to be part of the tennis community," says Goede. "Estrella Burgos put in an appearance when the regional under-12s event took place in Dominican Republic two years ago, and it's clear the children do get a spike of energy when someone like him is there. "It's been the same in Barbados. Darian King has been a star there for more than a decade, he's the product of ITF development and touring teams, he has represented Barbados, and he has helped a lot of good players to come out of Barbados. We now have highly certified coaches there, the facilities have improved – for example the national tennis centre has been expanded from four courts to seven – so the formula is there. We need to cherish the top players, and then they need to come back to spike the energy of the youngsters as role models." The entire COTECC region received a massive boost at this year's Roland Garros, with the victory in the men's doubles for Marcelo Arevalo and Jean-Julien Rojer. Rojer hails from Curacao in the Netherlands Antilles, but when that state was dissolved in 2010, Rojer had to choose another country. He now plays under the Netherlands flag, but he still has family in Curacao and continues to support the profile of tennis there. That included taking his Roland Garros trophy back there in June and showing it off at a big tennis party. Arevalo's achievement made him the first player from El Salvador to win a Grand Slam tournament main draw title. Having watched his elder brother Rafael play Roger Federer at the 2008 Beijing Olympics thanks to an Olympic wildcard awarded to expand the breadth of countries with Olympic participants, Marcelo almost gave up a few years ago but decided to focus on doubles. That revived his career, and at 31, he made history with Rojer and is now in the top 10 in doubles. Clockwise from top le : Curacao's Jean-Julien Rojer, le , li s the Roland Garros doubles trophy with El Salvador's Marcelo Arevalo El Salvador's Valen na Cruz Bonilla is con nuing her tennis at a US college Role models such as Dominican Republic's Victor Estrella Burgos are hugely important DEVELOPMENT 34 Summer 2022 ITF World

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