The new president and CEO of Tennis Canada flew to Paris to get a quick taste of the French Open, but wound up staying on account of rising star Eugenie Bouchard.
“She played brilliantly,” Kelly Murumets told the Star over the phone from France.
The 20-year-old Canadian tennis player beat Spain’s Carla Suarez Navarro in three sets in the quarter-finals, convincing Murumets to spend another day in Paris.
If Bouchard is able to defeat her one-time idol and four-time Grand Slam winner Maria Sharapova in the semifinals Thursday, Murumets will rebook her flight again without hesitation.
It’s just a small scale example of the power Bouchard holds.
“There is no question that Genie’s going to have a huge impact in our country,” Murumets said.
In many ways, she already has.
In January, Bouchard’s first Grand Slam semifinal at the Australian Open (which she lost in straight sets to Li Na) was the most-watched broadcast for that Grand Slam in Canadian history, said Vijay Setlur, sport marketing instructor at York University’s Schulich School of Business.
And even though she’ll play Sharapova on a weekday morning at 9 a.m. ET, Setlur said he could “still see it drawing in the millions.”
read more: http://www.thestar.com/sports/tennis/2014/06/05/french_open_eugenie_bouchards_star_power_helping_tennis_canada.html
