Nicolas Kohlhuber: published on Tuesday February 16, 2021 at 5:26 pm
On the night of Tuesday to Wednesday, Jessica Pegula will play the first quarterfinal of a grand slam tournament of her career. Yet the American is the richest player on the WTA Tour. Explanations.
On the WTA Tour, the richest player in the world isn’t Serena Williams, Simona Halep or Angelique Kerber. If these three former winners of the Australian Open have already won several tens of millions of euros thanks to their sporting performances, the one who has the most stocked bank account in world tennis will play this Wednesday in Melbourne the first quarter of Grand Slam final of her career: Jessica Pegula. The American has won only one WTA tournament, that of Washington in 2019, but she is the richest tennis player in the world. She is the daughter of a billionaire whose fortune is estimated at over five million dollars per Forbes. Terrence Pegula made his fortune in natural gas extraction, real estate and also the sports industry. The father of the 61st in the WTA rankings owns the Buffalo Sabers in NHL and the Buffalo Bills in NFL.
Despite the family wealth, Jessica Pegula wanted to forge her own path and chose tennis to make it happen. “When I was younger I wanted to make a name for myself and then growing up I realized I had to do with my family heritage. Tennis is my thing, it’s my job, my career. It’s very different from my parents’ activity and they don’t really have a say in what I do on the court, “the American told the media. On social networks, she still needs to remember that it is now thanks to her sporting exploits and not because of her name that she is talked about. But Jessica Pegula seems to be having fun. Today, the right-hander was right to believe in her dreams. At the gates of the top 100 for several seasons and in the top 60 of the WTA rankings since 2019, she eliminated Victoria Azarenka, Samantha Stosur, Kristina Mladenovic and Elina Svitolina to advance to the quarterfinals of the Australian Open. Full of confidence after her first victory over a world top 10 player, the 26-year-old may have finally launched her career. By the way, she pocketed $ 400,000. It is still far from the tournament earnings of Serena Williams, Simona Halep or Angelique Kerber, but it is also far from being her primary source of income.
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