Kenya’s tennis sensation Angela Okutoyi has set her sights on the French Open tournament, also known as Roland Garros.
The world clay court championship is scheduled to run from May 22 to June 5 in Paris.
Okutoyi, who turned 18 on Saturday, returned to the country on Saturday evening to a heroic welcome at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) after her short but sweet run at the 2022 Australian Open junior championships in Melbourne.
The teenage tennis star was received by her twin sister Roselida Asumwa, her uncle and former coach Allan Saha and her grandmother Mary Ndonda.
Accompanying the family were national Olympic Committee of Kenya (NOC-K) secretary general, Francis Mutuku, Tennis Kenya President James Kenani, secretary general Wanjiru Mbugua and the Davis Cup team led by Davis cup non-playing captain Rosemary Owino.
“I am so lucky to have the kind of support I have had so far that it got me to the Australian Open and helped me aim even higher. Getting to the third round of such a high level tournament is tough but I’m glad I achieved that to show other African players, especially girls that nothing is impossible.
“Now that the Australian open fete is behind me, I am now focusing on the next assignment and that I hope will be the French open because my 2022 goal was to hopefully play in all the major Grand Slams, get to at least the quarters and get to top 30 in the rankings and I still want that,” she said.
According to Okutoyi’s coach, Francis Rogoi her debut is just a start to having more Kenyan players in Grand Slam tournaments.
“I started coaching her when she was very young and seeing that she is getting to accomplish the things we used to talk about privately during training is my joy. This is the beginning. The stage has been set and the participants are ready to go. We just need increased support especially financially because tennis is an expensive sport,” said Rogoi.
Tennis Kenya president Kenani stressed the importance of having a high performance training centre in the country where all potential players can have access to world class facilities.
“Having Okutoyi at an ITF Centre for purposes of training has had a big impact on her latest performances and that is what we hope for all upcoming players who currently look up to her. It becomes difficult when we have to send the players outside the country to get such facilities and we have very little support,” he said.
On January 25, Okutoyi became the first Kenyan to go past the second round at a Grand Slam tournament. The teenage sensation outclassed Zara Larke of Australia in three straight sets of 7-6(7), 7-5,6-1 emerging top to qualify for the third round.
The debutant Okutoyi won her first match on January 23 when she defeated Italian Federica Urgesi 6-4, 6-7(5), 6-3, to become the first girl from Kenya to win an Australian Open juniors match. This was the first time Kenya was appearing in a Grand Slam tournament after a 16-year-hiatus.
Two-time Africa Junior Championship winner, Okutoyi, later fell in the third round losing 6-2,6-3 to her 17-year-old Serbian opponent Lola Radivojevic marking an end to her Australian Open journey.
The last time Kenya competed in the Australian Open juniors’ contest was in 2006 with Christian Vitulli losing in the first round of the main draw against New Zealand’s Austen Childs.
Paul Wekesa competed at the Australian Open from1989 to 1994. His best performance was reaching the second round in 1989 when he lost to Austrian Thomas Muster.
Okutoyi is also the second Kenyan girl to play at a Junior Grand Slam after Susan Wakhungu who featured at Wimbledon in 1978.
Okutoyi, who is currently ranked at position 71 in the ITF Junior rankings, started the journey to become a tennis professional at age four. She moved to Burundi aged 10 to train at the International Tennis Federation (ITF) East Africa Regional Training Centre, before returning to Nairobi two years later to develop her game at the ITF East Africa High Performance Centre in Nairobi.
Okutoyi already has several impressive achievements to her name, having won a number of local and regional titles. In 2018, she became the youngest player to win the Kenya Open. At the end of 2021, she won African Junior Championships, beating the top seed Aya El Aouni, in Sousse, Tunisia.
Okutoyi moved to Morocco in February 2021 to join the ITF high performance training centre where other Kenyans players like Ismael Changawa had previously been mentored.
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