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Fifteen-year-old Addison Roach has opened up about his experience of hitting with Jessica Pegula at the ongoing Credit One Charleston Open. Roach is a high-school freshman who hails from Mt. Pleasant, a large suburban town in South Carolina's Charleston County.
Pegula, the top seed at the Credit One Charleston Open, got off to a fine start in the second-round after receiving a first-round bye at the WTA 500 tournament. The 30-year-old came back from a set down to win against Amanda Anisimova, and is set to face Magda Linette in the Round of 16.
Roach shared his experience so far as Pegula's hitting partner in a recent interview. According to the 15-year-old, the overall experience with Jessica Pegula so far has been 'cool'. However, he also admitted to feeling nervous, especially when hitting with the WTA World No. 5 in front of a roaring crowd.
"It's really cool. It's probably one of the coolest things I've ever done. Lot of nerves walking out on to that stadium because Ons was coming off and everybody was cheering super loud. I immediately started sweating," Roach said in an interview with ABC News 4 (0:56).
"Really hard to grow tennis when everyone is in their own self-interest" - Jessica Pegula
Amid raging rumors of a merger that would potentially unite the ATP and the WTA, Pegula voiced her opinion on the subject in a recent interview. The 30-year-old believes that a merger could potentially make tennis a bigger and better sport. The American also pointed out the drawbacks of the existing system.
"It seems like everyone is pretty open to it. I feel like I would be open to it. I feel like it would make sense that it would be bigger and maybe better. It’s so hard with tennis because everything is so fractionalized and everything’s its own: There are the Grand Slams, and the ATP, and the WTA, and the ITFs, and every tournament is kind of run individually. So, it makes it really hard to grow the sport when everyone is in their own self-interest," Pegula told Front Office Sports.
The WTA World No. 5 also spoke about what it would mean for tennis to have more investments from Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF). According to Jessica Pegula, the PIF would want to handle its tennis investments better than it did its investments in golf.
"After seeing what happened with LIV and that kind of didn’t go well, it seems like they (PIF) want to do it in a better way because obviously they’re doing it to help sports and stuff, but they don’t want to look bad as well," Pegula added.
