THE ADAB TIMES
The Most Trusted Voice in the Nation, Est. 1878
The Most Trusted Voice in the Nation, Est. 1878
TENNIS
Who Exactly Are Adab’s Tennis Stars?
Sargon al-Basri
Saturday, September 23, 2034
DOPORTEDAS – Tennis is suddenly a hot item in Adab. After years on the decline following the retirement of the great Petros Samp, the sudden emergence of 18-year-old Foger Rederer and his fairytale run during the Olympics, triumphing against a series of older and much more experienced opponents, most notably the top-ten players Fiorenzo Tartoni and Andrew Simmons, on his way to winning the gold medal, has revived interest in the sport across the country. Sales of tennis balls and rackets have skyrocketed following Rederer’s victory, and courts across the country are filled to the brim all day long as men and women aged 7 to 77 rush to fulfill their weekly quota of tennis lessons.
The Adab Tennis Association is naturally keen to capitalize on this momentum, seeing this as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to establish Adab as a major player on the global tennis scene for years to come. So now, with the Britonish Open about to begin in Doportedas, three of the country’s brightest young talent, all aged 18 or under and coached by Petros Samp, stand ready to prove to the multiverse that the country’s Olympic triumph is no fluke. One of them is already a global star; the other two, many believe, are capable of reaching those same heights. Adabian tennis is here to stay. At least that is what the ATA hopes for.
Those three people are the best names in Adabian tennis right now. But they are more than just names on the scoresheet.
Amarsin Gandas
His own Olympic journey ended much earlier than Rederer’s, with a defeat in the round of 128 against Alexander du Lusavik of the Free Swiss States, but, at 17, he is still a “great player in the making”, insists Samp.
“Some people on social media gave him a hard time for that exit, and I will admit that he’s been overshadowed by Foger lately, but who isn’t? Still, Amarsin is not to be underestimated,” Samp told The Adab Times.
“In fact, I think Amarsin thrives even more when the pressure is on him.”
Amarsin Gandas was born in Adab City to a middle-class family. His parents are both doctors at one of the city’s largest hospitals. In his childhood, Gandas’ favorite sport was football. He played for his school’s under-9 and under-11 sides, winning local competitions and captaining the U-11 team. But by then a love affair with another sport was already starting. He began playing tennis at age 7, reportedly starting out with his father’s “old, dirty, worn-out” racket. As he took lessons and his talent became apparent, he tried juggling football and tennis, but in the end it became clear where his talent truly lay.
“After a game with the under-11 team, I realized that this was all becoming too much for me,” Gandas remembers. “I was playing in football and tennis tournaments and it was exhausting. I had to make a decision and drop one of them.”
Gandas had come to the attention of Petros Samp, who was always on the lookout for new, fresh talent and invited the young talent to join his tennis academy, widely regarded as the best in the country. That invitation was what led Gandas to his decision: “Football is a hobby for me, but tennis is my life.”
Under Samp’s supervision, Gandas quickly shot up through the national youth rankings, winning a series of tournaments. Serve and volley quickly became his hallmark, a playing style inherited from his coach Samp; Gandas is not an especially showy player, placing less emphasis on spectacular winners and more on producing average but consistently successful volleys and drop shots, scoring points before his opponent even reaches the net.
The biggest cause of concern is his endurance, with some observers worrying that Gandas tends to expend too much of his energy early in the match. Samp, for his part, is not worried. “He’s 17, he’s still got a lot of growing up to do, a lot of improvement in all aspects of his playing, like all other 17-year-olds. But he’s already a great player now, and I know he’ll be even greater.”
In his spare time Gandas enjoys reading, playing guitar, and joining his friends for an occasional game of football, which he still loves even as he now plays another sport for a living. Gandas loves reading about history and science; his parents claim that the first book he finished was Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time. Unlike Rederer, Gandas has reportedly shown no interest in becoming a public figure and values his privacy. “He’s just a kind, normal, down-to-earth guy,” says one of his high school classmates. “When we get together he doesn’t really like to talk about the tennis. He just wants to be one of us.”
Emily Romanescu
The daughter of a Romanian father and a half-Chinese, half-Romanian mother, the 17-year-old rising star has spoken of her multicultural upbringing. “I feel like a child of the world,” Romanescu told The Adab Times. “My family is like a mini World Assembly. I’ve got relatives everywhere from Budapest to Adab City to the end of the world. I think that’s a good thing for me, because I learned to appreciate different peoples and cultures from an early age.”
An only child, Emily Romanescu was born in Adab City. Her parents are both practicing lawyers, and the young tennis prospect has shown an interest in following them into the legal profession “if this tennis thing doesn’t work out”. She followed this statement by saying – rather atypically acknowledging her potential, even if only tacitly – that “maybe this tennis thing will work out after all”.
Romanescu did ballet, tap dancing, karting, and football as a child (she named the Adab football great Enlilbani Yargab as her greatest hero), but it was tennis that eventually became her passion. She began taking lessons at age 8, initially only for fun, but immediately showed such precocious talent that her first coach entered her into a series of local tournaments, all of which she won. This in turn brought her to the attention of Petros Samp, who personally traveled to her house and convinced her parents to let her attend his academy.
“Her parents were quite naturally protective of her, being an only child and all that, and not wanting to overburden her,” Samp remembers. “I told them, ‘Look, your daughter is one of the great talents of this generation. She loves doing this, she wants to keep doing this, and she has the potential to reach the stars. It would be a shame to let it all go to waste. This is her life.’ She wanted very much to go to the academy, and her parents eventually relented and supported her.’”
Romanescu’s string of successes continued under Samp’s guidance, winning several regional and national tournaments, and it was only a case of the flu that prevented her from joining Adab’s Olympic contingent. “Yeah, it was terrible,” she said, laughing. “But that’s all in the past now. I feel good now, and I feel I’m ready for the Britonish Open. I’m going to give it my best shot.”
Samp describes Romanescu as an “aggressive baseliner”; she likes to play from the back of the court, relying on her speed and strength to hit powerful passing shots which her opponents often cannot return in time. In Samp’s words, “She moves with such grace and hits like the devil.” Although she is more comfortable playing from the baseline, her speed enables her to cover large parts of the court and rush to the net from time to time, nullifying her opponents’ volleys. By her own admission, “my net game needs more work” and she tends to run out of steam towards the end of the match, “but I think that, if I just work hard enough, I can solve those issues and become a better player.”
An easygoing character, Romanescu has been described as “friendly” and “bubbly” by her friends and associates. She has also shown academic potential; her tennis career has not prevented her from maintaining straight-A grades in nearly all subjects. She enjoys photography and listening to music (particularly hip hop) in her spare time, and reportedly has asked Amarsin Gandas to teach her to paint. Excitable and approachable in public, she is quieter in private. “She’s very modest about it all. She’s not one to boast about her talent and her successes,” commented Foger Rederer. “And why should she? Just let the results speak for themselves.”
Foger Rederer
The man, the myth, the legend.
Foger Rederer’s Olympic triumph transformed the 18-year-old, in a period of under three weeks, from a total unknown outside Adabian tennis circles to perhaps one of the multiverse's greatest sporting heroes. “Foger is what every kid dreams and aspires to be,” Samp said after watching his charge receive the gold medal. “To come out of nowhere and beat all the heavyweights and become a famous national, even international, hero, he’s living everyone’s dream life right now.”
Although no one could have foreseen Rederer’s fairytale Olympic journey, those in the know within Adabian tennis had always known that Rederer was destined to aim for the stars. Born to a Swiss-Adabian father and native Adabian mother in Adab City, Rederer began hitting tennis balls from an early age and taking lessons from age 8. His father, a tennis fan himself, encouraged his son’s hobby but did not think much about it. “I knew he loved doing it, but I just thought that he was doing it for fun,” he said. “I never imagined that he would make a career out of this and surpass everyone’s expectations.”
Rederer’s story is already quite well known to the entire country by now. Aged 12, after winning a local event, he was spotted and immediately recruited by Petros Samp for his academy, under whose watch he went on to win more tournaments across the country over the next six years. While undoubtedly a great talent, Rederer did not particularly stand out to foreign observers, who decried the state of Adabian tennis following Samp’s retirement, and so it was somewhat of a shock when he was called up to Adab’s Olympic contingent. Was this 18-year-old really the best that the country could come up with?
But Samp and the ATA knew what they were doing. “Foger didn’t actually really stand out in terms of talent from the other top players in this country,” Samp said. “What made him stand out is his drive and hard work. He would train day and night, day and night. He is incredibly driven and committed to improving his game.” And of course, when it came to the Olympics, Rederer took the world by storm, playing with poise, maturity, and mettle uncommon among players his age. By his own admission most comfortable as a serve-and-volleyer, Rederer nevertheless demonstrated himself during the Olympics to be a great all-courter, seamlessly switching between being a baseliner and a serve-and-volleyer depending on the conditions of the match, totally unfazed by the rank and fame of the opponents that he demolished on the way to the gold medal. His greatest asset, though, is his endurance, which allowed him to survive the back-to-back marathon struggles against Mikhail Sonin (which took nearly four hours to finish), Rhys Escott, and Fiorenzio Tartoni. “Lesser players would fallen over after that Sonin match,” Samp said, “but not Foger. He just kept on pushing.”
Along the way, of course, he attracted publicity for his antics before and during the match, which included declaiming passages of a Charles Darwin book and singing the Velvet Underground to the spectators. This aspect of Rederer’s personality has continued to the present; upon being informed that he would be facing Amir Utama In the round of 96 of the Britonish Open, Rederer proclaimed, “I don’t know who Amir Utama is, but I know that I will destroy Amir Utama.” This, combined with his on-court excellence, contributed to his fame and publicity and helped him gather an increasingly large and devoted following.
Bold, brash, and, some people say, even insufferably confident when playing tennis, Rederer has been described as a quiet character in private. “All the antics, the ruckus, the trash-talking, that’s really just an act to bolster his own confidence,” said one of Rederer’s friends, speaking on condition of anonymity for this article. “Foger is one of the kindest and most humble people I’ve ever known. He’s actually a bit insecure about his tennis, and he still can’t believe he won the gold medal.” Rederer enjoys reading (particularly history) and listening to music in his free time; he has named Bruce Springsteen as his all-time favorite artist. He currently studies law at the University of Adab, and is reportedly uncomfortable with all the attention showered on him from his classmates. “Sometimes I wonder if he would just trade away all that fame and the gold medal if he could,” Samp said. “But so far he’s been handling it well.”
Rederer has shown an interest in social issues, joining the Olympic contingent in supporting the Ministry of Health’s You Are What Your Mind Is campaign, aimed at increasing awareness of mental health, and issuing a touching statement as part of the campaign, which offers a window into his attitude regarding his life and career:
I think that, more often than not, we tend to listen too much to what others think of us and want from us rather than doing what we actually want to do. We measure our self-esteem on others’ evaluation of us, even though most of them don’t even know us that well. What I think we should do is judge less and listen more. Make everyone feel welcome and comfortable to express even their innermost feelings. And if you are the one going through that, be kind to yourself and understand that your struggles don’t in any way diminish your worth as a human being. No amount of success at school or the workplace, no amount of praise from others are worth it if you feel cut off and unable to truly express yourself. No trophies or medals, no certificates of recognition deserve to be placed above your own personal happiness or your relationship with your friends and loved ones.
In general, if you are the one struggling, love yourself for who you are, don’t obsess over what others think of you, professional achievements matter less than personal happiness, take a break when you need to, prioritize your mental health and wellbeing. If you know someone who is struggling, try to understand them and listen to them. Reach out.
In general, if you are the one struggling, love yourself for who you are, don’t obsess over what others think of you, professional achievements matter less than personal happiness, take a break when you need to, prioritize your mental health and wellbeing. If you know someone who is struggling, try to understand them and listen to them. Reach out.
