I was junior Wimbledon champion and tipped for pro glory… but I retired aged 28 to take on cool new job
LAURA ROBSON was once tipped for tennis greatness but she is happy now she in a "cool new job".
The retired tennis ace was a junior Wimbledon champion when she was 14 despite being the youngest player in the Girls' Singles draw in 2008.
Robson started to show that she could achieve her potential after turning 18 as she was named the WTA Newcomer of the Year after reaching the fourth round of the US Open.
Robson also won the Olympic silver medal in the mixed doubles alongside Andy Murray at the London 2012 games.
The following year she reached the fourth round at Wimbledon but then started to be hampered by injuries.
The former British No.1 had wrist surgery as well as three hip operations which stopped her progress.
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Robson missed the entirety of the 2020 and 2021 seasons due to injury and announced her retirement last year.
However, despite packing up her racket her love for the sport has not diminished.
The 28-year-old has been working as a pundit for Eurosport and was also a tournament director for the Rothesay Open in Nottingham last month.
Now she has landed a job at Wimbledon.
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Robson has been hired as part of the international player relations team.
She told : "I think the appetite for tennis in the UK has been higher than ever over the last few weeks, but I'm at back at Wimbledon now and already planning my next holiday as I'm exhausted!
"I think there are different ways at being a tournament director, but I really wanted to be involved in the behind-the-scenes aspect of it.
"For me, I wanted to learn from the people that have run the events over the last few years, so we started back in January putting everything together.
"And kind of checking in quite regularly to see what we needed to update and what could be better for the players.
"But the week of [the tournament], you're just trying to make the experience out on court the best as you can.
"And I'm also on the player relations team here at Wimbledon, which is very similar in a lot of ways because we take in all the feedback that we get over the course of the event and seeing if hopefully we can see some improvements for next year already.
"But it's a year-long thing that you just have to keep thinking about basically, it's been very, very cool."
In her new role she has been spotted rubbing shoulders with the likes of Princess of Wales Kate Middleton.
Her main focus though is keeping players at Wimbledon happy.
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Robson still occasionally plays as she featured in the Ladies' invitation doubles at Wimbledon which is set up for retired players.
She lined up with Daniela Hantuchova but lost to Caroline Wozniacki and Cara Black.
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