Alexandra Willis

Indian Wells: the gift that keeps on giving

  * ALEXANDRA WILLIS is a multimedia tennis journalist who flits between Wimbledon, SportingIntelligence, the TennisSpace and a few other outlets, while tweeting copiously and trying to improve her (terrible) backhand in her spare time.    “If I were to go to a tennis tournament, it would be Indian Wells. No question.” That statement was not uttered by an employee of Desert Champions LLC, the company which owns and runs the 10-day hard court tournament at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden. It wasn’t anyone employed by Larry Ellison, one of the most popular benefactors in tennis, whose seemingly limitless chequebook has turned Indian Wells from the brink of a...


Laura Robson: an 18-year-old who loves cheesy music, teenage TV – and winning

 * ALEXANDRA WILLIS is a multimedia tennis journalist who flits between Wimbledon, SportingIntelligence, the TennisSpace and a few other outlets, while tweeting copiously and trying to improve her (terrible) backhand in her spare time.   .   . By Alexandra Willis 31 August 2012 With two Grand Slam champions on her tennis conquests sheet, a first Grand Slam fourth round, a first top 10 win, and a game so natural you couldn’t teach it, it’s all too easy to forget that Laura Robson is just an 18-year-old. But, as she dissolved into giggles at a One Direction reference during her post-match press conference, having shown no hesitation in lambasting Wayne Rooney for calling...


‘Tennis belongs at the Olympics … Both singles finals at London 2012 got better US TV ratings than any Slam in a decade’

* ALEXANDRA WILLIS is a multimedia tennis journalist who flits between Wimbledon, SportingIntelligence, the TennisSpace and a few other outlets, while tweeting copiously and trying to improve her backhand in her spare time. If you happen to bump into her court-side, she’ll probably tell you that she went to Oxford (and not just shopping). . . By Alexandra Willis 13 August 2012 The Olympics have finished their two-week stint in London, the pink 2012 hoarding that dominated the skylines and structures of so many venues now being dismantled as quickly as it was put up. The tennis world though, which pit-stopped in London’s south west SW19 corner  for the second...