THUNDER BAY — One of the premier and most storied prizes in international tennis paid a visit to the city.
The Davis Cup trophy, which was won by Canada last year, has been on tour across the country by Tennis Canada and was on display at the Thunder Bay Community Tennis Centre on Wednesday.
Thunder Bay Community Tennis Centre director Jamie Grieve said having the trophy on display is a big deal for the local tennis community.
“This is quite possibly a once-in-a-lifetime thing for Thunder Bay,” he said. “The people we’ve talked to thought it was pretty amazing.”
The star duo of Denis Shapovalov and Felix Auger-Aliassime each won their singles matches in the final against Australia on Nov. 27, 2022, to secure Canada’s maiden title in the sport’s main men’s international team event.
The Davis Cup — which has been called the World Cup of Tennis — dates back to 1900.
The Canadian contingent joins a long list of all-time greats — including Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Pete Sampras, Bjorn Borg, and Rod Laver — who have had their names etched onto the massive trophy.
Along with the trophy, Tennis Canada also supplied a green screen that allowed people to have their picture taken and imposed onto a background with Shapovalov and Auger-Aliassime, who have both spent time in the top-10 of world rankings and each have made an appearance in Grand Slam semifinals.
“Those guys are just so good,” Grieve said. “They can beat anyone on any given day.”
Grieve said some of the tennis centre’s young high-performance athletes were in awe of the trophy.
“The odd one said ‘I’m going to hold that one day,’ so it’s good to see,” he said. “What was really special was that we had some high school practices here and some kids that don’t have a lot of experience getting their picture taken.
“It’s a pretty big deal.”
Luca Tassone, 11, was one of the young players who spent some time on the courts Wednesday evening and had a photo taken with the Davis Cup.
“I thought it was pretty cool that we have the cup here, especially because we’re a smaller city,” he said.
Grieve said most of the stops on the cup's cross-Canada tour are at bigger clubs in larger cities
The Davis Cup triumph — combined with the 2019 U.S. Open title won by Bianca Andreescu and other Grand Slam finals appearances by Leylah Fernandez, Eugenie Bouchard and Milos Raonic in the last decade — have given the sport a larger platform in the country.
“Tennis across Canada is booming right now,” Grieve said.
