Burundi's leading light Nahimana finding results to match her ambition
“I still can’t believe it,” says Sada Nahimana.
I’m unsure if she’s referring to the ropey internet connection on our WhatsApp call or the fact that she’s just won both the singles and doubles titles at a professional tournament for the first time in Antalya.
I decide it’s the latter and once Sada has borrowed a friend’s phone and side-stepped a few paces to a reliable Wi-Fi hotspot, it turns out that assumption was a good call – just like ours becomes, thankfully.
Nahimana is 20 years old, the brightest tennis prospect in Burundi (one of the world's poorest nations) and fiercely motivated – as you’d expect from someone who has spent the majority of their teenage life away from home pursuing their tennis dream.
She’s also now the world No. 458, the latest reward for her aforementioned success on the ITF World Tennis Tour last week at W15 Antalya, where she won both her second career singles title without dropping a set and the doubles crown with Australian Olivia Gadecki.
It wasn’t all good news though.
“Unfortunately I hurt my ankle in the semi-finals and I have to stay here one more week,” she reveals. “With the adrenaline going I finished the match, and then I felt it so much. I did ice, physio, and then in the final I just went for it, but I can’t keep playing with it like this.
“I will go back to France and treat it, take care of it, and we’ll see where we go from there.”
Nahimana will be in good hands back in Nice where she has recently joined the Mouratoglou Tennis Academy, teaming with a new coach in Thomas Perrin, having fine-tuned her talent in a six-year stay at the ITF/CAT African Development Centre in Casablanca. Nahimana is entering the next phase of her career, and while she admits leaving Morocco was tough, she is relishing her new surroundings.
“The Casablanca centre was nice,” she says. “We were like a family. I was there for a long time and I had a good relationship with everyone. It was a sad time when I had to leave, but it was just that time.
“I’ve met a lot of friends [at the Mouratoglou academy] and it’s very good quality. There’s a lot of positive energy. It motivates you, you know? You want to wake up every morning and just keep doing it. It’s been very good for me.”
Despite her new surroundings, Nahimana knows there’s plenty of work to do and remains incredibly grounded. She’s particularly keen to explain her gratitude to the ITF, having gained numerous opportunities as a result of the governing body's support. As well as spending many years at the Morocco Centre and taking up a place in a number of Touring Teams though the ITF-administered Grand Slam Development Fund, she also received ITF Junior Player Grants in 2019 and 2020 - a reward for finishing in the Junior Top 20 - that enabled her to travel to tournaments and bolster her ranking.
“I don’t know where I would be without that help from the ITF,” she says. “I don’t think I’d be where I am now! The ITF really helped me. They played a big role in my tennis career. Even now, they’re helping me. I don’t know how to say it… but it’s like I’m their daughter! I don’t know where I’d be without them, really.”
Nahimana has more than justified the support. A model student on the court, she has proved to be a wise head on young shoulders off it - investing her grant money wisely. She used a portion of her 2019 grant to travel to an ITF tournament in Nigeria - at W25 Lagos - and left the event with her first professional title.
An easy conversationalist with an infectiously warm and bubbly personality, it's easy to understand why Nahimana stood out amongst her peers - although those traits are, of course, hardly the reasons for why she was singled out for ITF support. More relevant is that Nahimana is bursting with drive and talent and, in a measured but self-assured way, she knows it.
“I can do everything,” Nahimana says of her abilities on a tennis court. “I’m comfortable at the baseline. I’ve got good touch. I do a lot of drop shots. I run a lot. I’m an all court player.
“It’s just a matter of adapting to be more aggressive. But I can do everything.”
That bodes well for Burundi, a nation that is hardly a hotbed for tennis. Football and running capture the greatest attention amongst locals, says Nahimana, and the country has just one major tennis club, L’Entente Sportive in the capital city of Bujumbura, which doubles up as her second home.
“I go back to Burundi whenever I have the chance – once or twice a year – and when I’m there, I’m always at the club,” says Nahimana. “All my friends are tennis players so I’m at the tennis club every day. I don’t have a lot of people to play with there but I enjoy just being in the environment. I try to play there as much I can.”
Nahimana was attracted to tennis by her father, a tennis coach, while her brother Hassan Ndayishimiye was a Top 30 junior, notably becoming the first Burundian player to compete in Junior Grand Slams in 2011. While her family has no doubt inspired her love of the sport, Nahimana's talent and application for it has given her a unique platform that she’s determined to capitalise on.
Well aware that she’s the only female from Burundi currently holding a WTA ranking (Guy Orly Iradukunda, the world No. 793, is her male equivalent on the ATP Tour), Nahimana is intent on creating a legacy as much as succeeding for herself.
“I want to achieve something that will make African tennis grow,” she says. “I want to be the first black African player to really make it in tennis.
“There’s a lot of black African players from West Africa, East Africa (I’m not talking about South Africa because they have sponsors down there and they’re the only ones who have sponsors apart from North Africa). But most of those kids start playing to a good level and end up in college because they didn’t have the support they needed, even with the talent they have.
“It’s almost like they’re playing for nothing. No-one sees them. For me to have this opportunity to play... well, I don’t want to give up. I want to continue. I want to make a name for myself, I want to set an example and I want to make everyone believe that we can make it. We Africans really have potential."