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Tennis players change their nationality on a fairly regular basis – sometimes for money or better opportunities, or to play Davis or Billie Jean King Cup where they might not be cut in their own country.
(This does not always work – See Aljaz Bewind van Slovakia and Groot -Britain).
But Aussie/Japanese player Akira Santillan has been a jojo in that respect.
And from last month the number 510 player and former highly regarded Junior Prospect-Alex de Minaur, Jordan Thompson and Alexei Pofyrin have gone from Australia to … Japan.
Santillan, now 28, was born in Japan from a Japanese mother and South African father. But he moved to the Gold Coast of Australia when he was eight.
According to the Australian, he represented Australia until 2015 through his junior career, including wearing the flag in the Junior Davis Cup in 2013. That included when he won the Canadian Junior event 2014, The Big Tuneup for the Junior US Open.
And then he made the Australian Open Junior Boys’ Semis in January and switched to the representation of Japan “amid friction between his family and Tennis Australia”.
(It is not difficult to find out what … that means).
But then, after Wimbledon in 2017, he decided that he was Australian again.
“I played for Japan for the past year and a half, but I feel that I am more Australian. I grew up there and speak better English. Japanese is my first language, but most of my friends are Australian and I feel more at ease as Aussie,” he said the Australian. “I am a fiery character on the field, so it fits well. I made the decision at Wimbledon and I am happy with it.”
(It was so long ago that Alejandro Tabilo from Chile and Filip Peliwo van Polen was still with the Canadian flag waved).
Santillan went from Wimbledon, where he lost in the first qualifying round to the American Denis Kudla, directly to the Winnetka Challenger in Illinois – and won it. He reached his career High singles ranking of no. 144 at the end of that season.
Santillan is good friends with Nick Kyrgios. And he has always been on our radar because of some drama in the qualification of Wimbledon in 2019.
Kyrgios, instead of practicing, spent a large part of the day at Roehampton by supporting his friends, including Santillan and Tommy Paul.
And when Santillan completely lost it, after dropping a heartache on Ruben Bemelmans of Belgium, he was there to offer advice. And he even talked to him the next day to come back, to encourage Paul, in vain, in the final round.
(That is Kyrgios who peek over the fence to the final phases of the defeat of Santillan, who was 12-10 in the third set in the days before the tiebreak of the match and a bleached blonde Santillan the next day, when Paul lost a three-setter in the last round of Jiri Vesely).
This is how Santillan looked like during that competition; He was then not -consolidable, blows the doping man with the clipboard and then made a mutilated mountain of his tennis rackets.
Fast Foward eight years, with life not like planned – and Santillan is again ‘Japanese’.
His first tournament under his new flag came last month, an ITF of $ 30,000 in Yinchuan, China. He won it. It bumped its prize money for 2025 just more than $ 15,000 and its ATP ranking list from No. 623 to No. 516.
We don’t know for sure where the benefit is, because the switch makes him the 21st ranking, where before he was the 24th ranking.
What is more remarkable is that Santillan has been a full -time pro for more than a decade, on average about $ 50,000 in income (about a third of his total career revenue, $ 133,000, came back in 2017). And yet he plays almost every week; This year he played 18 tournaments in Turkey, Thailand and China, just over $ 15,000 in prize money.
We don’t know how these guys are doing. We also cannot understand how, ten years later and are once viable dreams to be a top pro, they still continue.
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