Jasmine Paolini, a quarterfinal that Italy has been missing since 2014
Jasmine Paolini is the first Italian to reach the quarterfinals at the Internazionali BNL d’Italia in women’s singles since 2014, since the final lost by an injured Sara Errani to Serena Williams.
Three Italian victories in women’s singles in the tournament’s history. In 1931, Lucia Valerio triumphed on the beloved courts of the Milan Tennis Club where she grew up developing a tennis of painstaking patience.
In 1950, in Rome, in the first edition of the tournament after World War II, she won the title Annelies Ullstein, a German born in 1915 in Dresden, who married a promising Italian player, Renato Bossi, who died prematurely, then Giorgio Bellani, incomparable radio and TV commentator. Elegant, charming and an excellent tennis player, she was the only Italian to be included, in ’49 and ’50, in the top ten list of the world compiled by British journalist Lance Tingay.
In 1985, in the only edition played in Taranto, Raffella Reggi put her name on the roll of gold in singles and doubles, a year before her triumph in mixed doubles at the 1986 US Open with Sergio Casal.
