By Chuin-Wei Yap
BEIJING-- Li Na, Asia's biggest tennis star, said Friday she is
retiring from the sport, capping a career in which she became the
first Asian woman to win a Grand Slam, as well as an iconoclastic
personality that made her one of China's most marketable sports
stars.
The 32-year-old said in statements via her verified Chinese
social-media microblog and Facebook that four surgeries on her
knees to heal pain and swelling had taken their toll, including the
most recent in July on her left knee. "My chronic injuries will
never again let me be the tennis player that I can be," she
wrote.
Li had been scheduled to play in the Wuhan Open, which kicks off
Friday in the city where she was raised, and which had secured its
place on the professional women's tennis circuit largely because of
her clout.
Li's career has been a matter of intense interest in the tennis
world for months. The two-time Grand Slam champion, who earlier
this year reached her career-high ranking of world No. 2, said in
July that she would pull out of a series of tournaments, including
the U.S. Open, due to a knee injury.
Injuries are common in tennis, and players often pull out of
matches. However, scrutiny intensified after an on-air remark by a
U.S.-based sports analyst during the U.S. Open on Aug. 31 suggested
Li would be retiring after the China Open tournament scheduled for
October in Beijing. Li's agent, Max Eisenbud, said days later that
the Chinese star wasn't retiring.
The longevity of Li's career continued to engross the Chinese on
social media. On Thursday, state broadcaster China Central
Television issued a post on its microblog about Li's impending
plans.
In her statement Friday, Li said she hoped to spend more time
with her family. Some bloggers in China wondered whether she was
preparing to become a mother. Li didn't directly address this in
Friday's statement.
Li had big stakes on the table. Come January, she would have
been defending her Australian Open title, after a string of
tournaments in the tennis circuit's Asian leg in Beijing and
Singapore.
Li didn't address how or whether she plans to retain a role in
China's $4 billion tennis market, much of which had been built
around her star power. Local television broadcasts of major tennis
tournaments are incomplete without big chunks of commercials
featuring Li. Her image powers sales of local brands of milk and
mineral water.
Tennis analysts say there is a roster of younger Chinese women,
including Peng Shuai and Zhang Shuai, who are likely to vie for her
mantle. But they say newer players still lack the personal charm
and English-language ability that has turned Li into a marketing
powerhouse.
"It's sad--she's been a game changer for China's tennis. The
country doesn't have that many A-level celebrity sports stars,"
said Terry Rhoads, managing director of Shanghai-based sports
branding agency Zou Marketing. "I've known her since she was 12.
She's absolutely surpassed everyone's fantasies in terms of what
she's done."
In the year to June, Forbes ranked Li the second-highest-paid
female tennis player behind Maria Sharapova--fifth-highest overall,
if counting the men's tour--raking in $23.6 million, three-quarters
of which come from endorsements. Her sponsors include Rolex, Crown
Casino, Visa, Mercedes-Benz, Nike and Haagen-Dazs. It's still
unclear how Li's retirement will affect those endorsements. The
companies declined to comment or weren't immediately available for
comment Friday.
Li is an icon in China also because she, along with three other
top female players, battled China's tightly controlled state sports
system and forced the government in 2008 to create a policy called
danfei--flying solo--under which the quartet were allowed to set
their own schedules, pick their own coaches and keep most of their
earnings.
In 2011, Li became the first Chinese and first Asia-born person
to win a Grand Slam, sweeping crowd favorite Francesca Schiavone to
take the French Open. "If a Chinese player can win a Grand Slam,
maybe it proves a lot for Chinese tennis," she said at the time. "I
believe Chinese tennis will get bigger and bigger."
She went on to win this year's Australian Open, one of the four
annual Grand Slams that make up the top tier of the professional
tennis circuit. But she has had a troubled time since. In July,
along with the announcements of her injury and pullouts, she split
with longtime coach Carlos Rodriguez, widely seen as the architect
of her professional surge.
Write to Chuin-Wei Yap at chuin-wei.yap@wsj.com
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