Nguyen Hoang Thien, the 16-year-old tennis talent of Vietnam, returned home on February 15 from his first overseas competition in 2011 with satisfactory results.

Nguyen Hoang Thien. (Photo: TP)

Thien won a match in the Australian Open qualifying round for young players, entered the U18-ITF group 4 semi finals in men’s singles and won the men’s doubles championship title in the same event.

“Playing against many young players who rank highly in the world rankings has helped me improve my skills. I have to study much more, for example how to allocate my power, ball serving technique, the left-hand blow, etc.,” said Thien.

His father, Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Minh, who accompanied Thien in the recent tour, said: “Thien’s first competition at the Junior Grand Slam is my family’s pride but we don’t entertain illusions because there are hundreds of players in the world who practice tennis everyday.”

“If we entertain illusions with the current achievements, Thien will be lag behind them. Moreover, the achievements in tennis changes very quickly. You will have to pay for mistakes and inattentive moments by falling in the ranking list. Thien is now in the top 300 so he will have to try harder. We and experts will analyze his recent matches to learn from them”.

Thien has been practicing tennis for six years, with huge investments from his family. In the past two years, HCM City has invested in this talent through the local Sports Talent Fund. However, the Vietnam Tennis Federation doesn’t do anything to support this player.

Previously, the Vietnam Olympic Committee acquired the International Olympic Committee’s scholarship ($600/month) for tennis player Ngo Viet Ha from 2006 to 2012. Two years after getting the scholarship, Ha settled down abroad and didn’t play tennis for Vietnam. This was a great waste because the scholarship is the dream of all young tennis players in Vietnam.

Besides finances, Thien needs assistance in registering for international tournaments.

According Thien’s two French coaches, Tom Kindavong and Marcel Dominique Petit, if Thien maintains his current position in the top 100 junior players of the world, he may meet criteria to compete in the three remaining Grand Slam tournaments for young players in 2011: the French Open (late May, early June), Wimbledon (late June, early July) and the US Open (late August, early September).

As scheduled, Thien will take part in four tournaments within one month starting from February 25 in Thailand, Malaysia and the Philippines.

He will then travel to France for training and competing until the end of this year. He will work with his two coaches to improve his performance on the clay court.

PV