'Thank you, Wimbledon'

Tammy reveals how good show on grass in 2006 saved her career

If it was not for Wimbledon, local sweetheart Tamarine Tanasugarn would have already turned her back on tennis two years ago.

Plagued with injuries and depressed by bad performances, Tammy was mulling about quitting tennis before she bounced back on the surface she loves the most: at the grass of the All-England Club where she reached the third round in 2006 as a qualifier.

"When you practice hard and still play bad, you wonder about the purpose of going on. So I rolled my last dice at Wimbledon. It turned out that my career was not over," said Tammy who received a celeb-rity welcome on her return yesterday amid huge attention from fans and the media.

And it was on the Wimbledon lawns where she climbed to the zenith of her career by reaching the quarter-finals of a Grand Slam for the first time. Her name was also recorded in the Wimbledon Hall of Fame as the first ever Thai quarter-finalist.

"Unquestionably being in the last eight at Wimbledon is the peak of my career. Two years ago when I was at a low, I wouldn't have imagined this," added Tamarine who returned home Bt7 million richer from prize money won in Holland, where she won her second trophy, and from Wimbledon.

At 31, her best tennis has arrived unusually late compared to fellow players who display their best tennis in their early 20s. Despite being counted as the oldest among the last-16 players in the grass Major this year, Tamarine considers herself the wisest of them all.

"When you are older, you have been through a lot of things more than other girls."