Osaka lights Olympic Cauldron to launch Tokyo 2020 Games
Japan’s Naomi Osaka, the reigning US and Australian Open champion and world No. 2, took centre stage at the Tokyo 2020 Opening Ceremony as she became the first tennis player in history to light the Olympic Cauldron that heralds the start of the Olympic Games.
The 23-year-old completed the final leg of the Olympic relay, accepting the flame from six schoolchildren from the host nation before ascending the stairs that emerged from a symbolic Mount Fuji to ignite the Cauldron. Dressed in an all-white shirt and shorts with a flash of red on her chest, reminiscent of the outfit worn by torch relay runners at the Tokyo 1964 Games, she turned and waved to the athletes gathered in the stands with the flame ablaze at the Tokyo Olympic Stadium.
"Undoubtedly the greatest athletic achievement and honor I will ever have in my life," Osaka posted to Instagram soon after the Ceremony. "I have no words to describe the feelings I have right now but I do know I am currently filled with gratefulness and thankfulness."
Instantly iconic and culturally historic, the moment underscores Osaka’s status as the face of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, as well as her impact beyond both the realms of tennis and sport. Twice a US Open and Australian Open champion, she ranks among the women’s singles medal favourites in Tokyo, while her off-court activism and following have seen her influence grow across the cultural spectrum.
Earlier on the day of the Opening Ceremony, news broke that Osaka’s first-round match against China’s Zheng SaiSai, initially scheduled to open the Centre Court action at Ariake Tennis Park on Day 1 of the Games, had been removed from Saturday’s revised order of play. Tokyo 2020 organisers later confirmed that the match would be rescheduled on Sunday.
The move sparked speculation that the former world No. 1 might have a prominent role to play in the Opening Ceremony, which began at 8pm local time. And so it proved: the national heroine, born in the city whose name she shares to a Japanese mother and Haitian father, and raised in the United States, was given the honour of bringing a ceremony that balanced poignancy and celebration to an inspiring climax.
Osaka’s shining moment followed the Parade of Nations, which for the first time featured two flagbearers - one male, one female - representing the majority of nations at the Games. Four tennis players were chosen to serve as flagbearers: Czech Republic’s Petra Kvitova, who won women’s singles bronze at Rio 2016; 2017 Roland Garros champion Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia; Paraguay’s Veronica Cepede Royg; and Chinese Taipei’s Yen-Hsun Lu.
The Olympic Tennis Event begins on Saturday 24 July, the day after the Opening Ceremony, and will conclude with the third day of medal matches on Sunday 1 August.