Highland tennis star Isabelle Wallace chooses to represent Australia in bid to boost her career
Paperwork was filed with the International Tennis Federation last week to complete the switch, which Wallace puts down to the better support and mentoring available from Tennis Australia.
Cradlehall teenager Wallace (19) has chosen to represent Australia before and spent six years there with her family from the age of 10. Upon returning to the United Kingdom in 2012, Wallace stated her allegiance to Great Britain in ITF tournaments up until last week.
The decision for her to play under the Australian flag was a family one and it is one that she has no regrets over.
“Me and my family thought I would get more support than we do through the LTA (Lawn Tennis Association). I feel comfortable being under the Australian flag,” she said. “I spent six years of my development there and played in the juniors for them, so it’s nothing strange.
“They’re good at catching up with you and staying in contact and it’s where I see the future of my tennis. This will probably be my last change.”
While playing in Australia, Wallace trained in Melbourne and played junior Fed Cup tennis for her adopted nation in 2012. She possesses an Australian passport and is therefore eligible to represent both nations. ITF regulations state players can change nationality as often as they like until they have represented one country in the Olympic Games or in team competitions, such as the Davis Cup. It does not affect who they represent in tour events or Grand Slams.
Parents Alan and Diane relocated back to Inverness in 2012 and set up their own business, The Bakery on Tomnahurich Street, and financially support their daughter’s career. She is currently ranked 779th in the world in singles and 796th in doubles, spending the majority of her time at the TenisVal centre in Valencia, Spain.
Wallace said changing nationalities was initially just mooted but after a period of consideration, decided to press ahead with it.
“It was my mum that first mentioned it to me but we decided to leave it for a while. It was just a thought initially, without really thinking about acting on it,” said Wallace, while raising questions over the LTA, the sport’s governing body in the UK, and their policies.
“It’s difficult because the method they have of developing players doesn’t really help a lot of them,” she added. “The Australian set-up is very professional and I’m 100 per cent behind this decision.”
Her father Alan spoke out about the lack of progress in Scottish tennis in 2012, while Jamie Murray has criticised Tennis Scotland for failing to capitalise on his own brother’s success by improving infrastructure and growing the sport.
After what she describes as a tough year, in which her ranking has dropped 70 places, she is targeting a big push into the world’s top 300 next year.
“I didn’t defend my ranking in as many tournaments as I would have liked, but I feel recently I’ve been improving and got my ranking back up again,” she said.
“I’ll be entering more $25,000 (£16,447) tournaments next year rather than $10,000(£6579) ones.”
