Meet the ITF World Tennis Tour Player Panel: Ines Ibbou

Last month, the ITF announced the players elected to the newly-created ITF World Tennis Tour Player Panel. The members will sit on the Panel until the end of the 2021 season and for two-year terms thereafter.

We spoke to all the players on both the men's tennis and women's tennis panels, to find out about their tennis careers to date and their hopes for what they can achieve during their time as panel members. On the women's tennis panel we have already spoken to Conny Perrin, Olivia Tjandramulia, Petra Januskova and Yuliana Lizarazo.

This time, we hear from Ines Ibbou, a 21-year-old player from Algeria. Ibbou was a talented junior player, reaching a career-high junior ranking of No. 23 and playing in the junior events at all four Grand Slams. As a professional, she has won two singles and two doubles titles at ITF World Tennis Tour-level and reached a career-high WTA ranking of No. 604 last year. Here's what she had to say...

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I began playing tennis by accident when I was six and I instantly fell in love with it. I am lucky because in my country, Algeria, tennis is unfortunately still really uncommon and very rare.

Around eight years old I started traveling internationally to play national tournaments during holidays in France, but with very little means. I then travelled around the world to play and reached No. 23 in the ITF junior rankings, which was a fantastic achievement given my circumstance. I even had the chance to live this amazing experience of playing the junior events at the Grand Slams which gave me a lot of hope for the future of my career. Unfortunately the transition to professional tennis was very difficult. I didn’t have the right guidance at the right time, and I suffered from financial problems and injuries.

However, I never gave up and I also was lucky to have found amazing people to help me out during the worst moments of my career. I have always felt grateful to have those great people around me.

There are plenty of highlights in my career so far – for sure, the junior Slams would be among those. However, I have to confess that the Qatar Open in 2020 was such an amazing moment. Playing against the best players in the world is always an amazing experience, and I had the chance to live that with my loved ones supporting me. Such an epic feeling! 

As an African player I have had to face many issues trying to become a professional tennis player such as problems with traveling and visas, funding challenges, and a comparative lack of tournaments in my region. I wanted to shed light on another reality and make sure that different voices heard. I think it’s now time for tennis to be more equal, improve conditions and give better opportunities. Tennis has to improve and we have to work all together to make tennis for all.  

I would like to make sure that the ITF and other tennis federations are doing their best to protect and help players and everyone affected in this difficult time. This is a good moment to reflect on our beloved sport and share new ideas to improve the tour. The current Covid crisis should be a wake-up call. Tennis players are the heart of this sport. No decisions or actions should be taken without players.