If you think Roger Federer has broken a few records in his time, wait until you see Kei Nishikori. The quiet man from Shimane has been reinventing Japanese tennis from the moment he picked up a tennis racquet.
Just this week, for instance, he became the first Japanese man in the open era to reach the fourth round of the Australian Open. At the US Open in 2008, he became the first Japanese man to reach the fourth round since 1937 and at the Shanghai Rolex Masters last October, he reached the semifinals for the first time in his career and, by doing so, leapt up the rankings to No.30 and became the highest-ranked Japanese male player since tennis went professional. It is not bad for a bloke who has yet to play a full, injury-free season on the ATP tour.
When Nishikori announced his arrival on the main tour in 2008, winning the title in Delray Beach, he seemed set for stardom. Coming through the qualifying competition, he battled through to the final and beat James Blake, then the world No.12, to lift the trophy. He had made it.
But just as he was settling into life as a rising professional, he was knocked back by an elbow injury. Following surgery, most of 2009 was spent in rehab with the physios and by the time he was passed fit to play again in 2010, his ranking had slumped to 898. It was back to the drawing board – he had to start all over again.
Nishikori, though, is a driven soul. From the moment he started playing at the age of five, he has been keen to learn and happy to work and so he set about climbing the rankings again. By the end of 2010, he had collected four Challenger titles and hauled himself back to No.98 in the world. And that was the springboard from which to launch the most successful season of his career.
With the achievements of Shuzo Matsuoka as his benchmark, last year Nishikori started rattling off the results: the finals of Houston and Basel, the semifinals of Shanghai, Kuala Lumpur and Eastbourne and the scalps of Novak Djokovic, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Tomas Berdych. By the end of the season he was ranked No.25 in the world pecking order – an impressive achievement given he had fought off a shoulder injury while he was racking up the ranking points – and he was Japan’s most successful player.
"That was one of my main goals in 2011,” he said. “It was good to get through the year by playing consistently to break Shuzo's record. I talked to him after that and he said, 'it's not your final goal'. He told me I can do more and continue doing my best to get a higher ranking. It was a great year for me. I get to high highest ranking. To be No.1 player in Japan, it means a lot to me. "
Much as Nishikori looks up to Matsuoka, he has spent his career destroying the veteran’s records. The one achievement he has yet to match is Matsuoka’s best Grand Slam performance – a quarterfinal place at Wimbledon in 1995. To do it here, he would need to beat Tsonga but this is only the start of the year; there are plenty of major championships to come.
Finally, Nishikori is getting the rewards he deserves for all his efforts. Leaving Japan as a 14-year-old, he pitched up at Nick Bollettieri’s academy in Florida, the tennis factory that produced the likes of Jim Courier, Monica Seles and Andre Agassi. When he got there, he spoke not a word of English but despite the loneliness and the homesickness, he knuckled down and tried to learn the ways of the tennis world.
“For me it is helping me that I was in US when I was little, playing with all the different players,” he said. “There is a lot of power players, a lot of different type of the players. So I think that helps me to learn how to win against them.”
Shy and unable to talk to his peers, he found it hard to fit into the brasher, American sports environment but, even so, he stuck at it and mopped up whatever information the coaches had to impart like a sponge. Slowly but surely, he came out of his shell until, at the age of 18 he won that first career title and was catapulted to stardom back home in Japan. Suddenly he had a massive fan base and he was mobbed when he set foot on home soil again.
“It is special feeling when I go back to Japan,” Nishikori said. “The people sometimes realise me when I walk in the street. But it is something special. Usually you don't get the feeling. I really enjoying how the life is going on.”
While Nishikori was recovering from his elbow problems in 2009, Kimiko Date-Krumm came out of retirement and relaunched her career. Now the two are playing mixed doubles here and are hoping to play at the Olympics in London later this year. Japanese tennis now has two stars to follow and if they can get near the medals at the Olympics, Nishikori and Date-Krumm might just spark a revolution back home.
“I would like to play mixed doubles if we can get in,” Nishikori said. “That's the goal for us. But, yeah, played last time in China, 2008. I played horrible match. I felt a lot of pressure in Olympics. It's only once a four years.
“But I'm excited this year ‘cause my ranking is up now and I'm really confident. I don't know if I can get the medal, but if I can do well, if I can play my best tennis, then I think I have some chance.
“I think baseball and soccer is one of biggest sports in Japan. But I think tennis is getting better in these two, three years. A lot of kids playing, start playing. Me and Kimiko Date came back. Tennis is getting more popular now. I think a lot of kids start playing. So tennis is getting popular in Japan.”
The history of Japanese tennis is there to be rewritten and Nishikori seems just the man to do it.