The jurisprudence of French tennis on children destined for glory, who we will randomly name Richard G, encourages us to be cautious when a teenager emerges above the fray. Let’s make an exception for the case of Ksenia Efremova. The 14-year-old has been heralded as the future terror of the women’s circuit for as long as she has held a racket, and the predictions seem to have not been wrong. Efremova ended the year 2023 by winning her first trophy among the pros in Monastir by demolishing poor Selina Dal, 720th WTA, eight years her senior (7-5, 6-0). 2024 will also start very strong, with a wild card for the Australian Junior Open.
His next challenge? Don’t let the tricolor loss rub off on your future. Because the Russian native obtained French nationality in the fall of 2023, four years after arriving in the South-East to join the Mouratoglou academy. “I was very happy to know that I was going to have a French passport, she told Tennis Majors. Now I can travel easily. I can represent France, I have lived here for years and I feel at home here. For my brothers and my mother too, it is important. We can travel, my brother will go to an American university next year. » It sounds a little opportunistic and it is said with the frankness of childhood, but the story as written by his clan also lends to the choice of French nationality a form of gratitude: before dying of a long illness in 2021, his father was followed by the best cancer specialists in France.
Behind the careers of these young naturalized French tennis players there is always a story. Not all of them are dramatic, some are even cute or even anecdotal. This is what we learned from the lives of three other naturalized players: Luca Van Assche (19 years old, 63rd ATP) and Varvara Gracheva (23 years old, 39th world), both present in the first round of the Open Australia, as well as Daniel Jade (14 years old, winner of the European Junior Masters).
Luca Van Assche (19 years old), on behalf of the mother
Origins: Belgian father, Italian mother.
Circumstances of his arrival in France: Move linked to father’s professional situation. Luca arrived in France at the age of 3. He lived first in Aix-en-Provence then in Lyon, then in Paris.
The story told by: Hélène Gondran, one of his first coaches in Lyon
“When I got him, I found him to be a talented player. Logically, he ended up having League training, but he was Italian through his mother. However, we can train foreigners in the League up to a certain limit. I warned his mother that if Luca wanted to stay in League training, he had to be French, especially if one day he wanted to be invited to Roland-Garros… She looked at me with big eyes as if to say “my child At eight years old, she’s completely crazy (laughs).” But she trusted me. Luca was less than ten years old, so the naturalization procedure fell to the mother, who left for Nantes to participate in an interview. She had revised the entire history of France. And I think she made no secret of the fact that she was doing this for her son, so that he could continue to train in the best conditions, and benefit from regional and league aid. »
Varvara Gracheva (23 years old), the bargain of French tennis
Origin : Russian
Circumstances of his arrival in France: Her mother, a tennis teacher, trained her until she was 14 before seeking to place her in a renowned academy. What she will find in the Elite Tennis Center of Jean-René Lisnard, where she will land at 16 years old.
The story told by… Jean-René Lisnard
“It’s the right opportunity that fell out of the truck. We didn’t know Varvara at all when her mother introduced her to us. She must have heard about our center, and that’s how it happened. She was a good player, but you can meet a lot of them among young people at international level. We didn’t take her right away, she had to wait for a place to become available with us. As her mother was still working, she entrusted Varvara to us a little, in a way. We managed his whole life, his career, his thing.
Later, I suggested that he do his paperwork, especially since they [les Russes] need visas to travel to all countries, it’s hell. The conflict with Ukraine was added to all this [Varvara Gracheva a nié tout lien entre sa naturalisation et la guerre], to make matters worse. Varvara has lived here for seven years, she has acquired accommodation, she pays her bills… it was natural for her to do so, it is her adopted country. And given his level, there is also obviously an interest in France. »
Daniel Jade (14 years old), the youngest
Origin : Lebanese
Circumstances of his arrival in France : The explosions at the port of Beirut and the complicated situation in Lebanon, which pushed his parents to send him to France two and a half years ago.
The story told by… his former coach, Robin Bailly and the president of the Normandy League, Olivier Halbout
RB “Daniel’s parents have family half an hour from Rouen, they have settled the children there. They quickly inquired about finding a tennis club, and got in touch with us. When Daniel played his first tournaments during the summer, he won a lot of matches, we saw that he had potential. His ability to work first struck us. His overall level was interesting, but the technical level was low, which he quickly managed to correct as he is a big competitor. And he knew how to manage the distance very well. He only saw his parents every six to seven weeks during school holidays, and yet I only saw him cry once, in the second month. »
OH: “The naturalization process was a family wish. It should be noted that his parents are lovers of France. The dad studied in France, he speaks French perfectly, and it’s the same for the mom. Very quickly we got started with the head of state relations at the federation to follow up on the naturalization request. [Daniel est devenu français en décembre 2022]. Since then, he has been in the final of the small aces, European champion with the French team, been finalist of the European championship, and he won the French Open Stadium. »
No naturalization strategy for young talents
Contacted by 20 minutes, the French Tennis Federation says it is “very proud to be able to support the journeys and individual choices of these young players, and to contribute to the emergence of a promising new generation of champions, necessary for the attractiveness of and the performance of French tennis”. The FFT assures to stay away from these decisions, from the personnel order, going in the direction of the various testimonies collected. For Olivier Halbout, it would be “an error to make a particular case a strategy. »
These personal stories also illustrate the safeguards of national tennis against the training of players who, as adults, might not represent France. “Training young people from foreign federations is not our vocation,” explains Halbout. You must therefore be able to justify certain expenses. Somehow, it’s public money. For the federation, it was the same: Daniel Jade could not play in the French team, and from the moment you play in EDF, aid is created, with the region, the department… Without French nationality, it can slow down a project. »
Gracheva’s case is a little different: as a member of a private structure, her career did not depend on her naturalization. The Elite Tennis Center had, a priori, no particular interest in pushing her in this direction. “On the contrary,” Lisnard advances. Because if tomorrow the FFT told her “come and train at the National Training Center, everything is free” we would lose the player. But I love my country, I feel like we did a good deed. And if it can be of service to France…”