Burrage: ITF prize money boosts are 'massively helpful'
Britain's Jodie Burrage has been one of the stand-out performers on the ITF World Tennis Tour in the final quarter of 2024, rounding off her year in impressive fashion with a win at W100 Dubai earlier this month.
Burrage achieved a career-high ranking of No. 84 last March after a run to the quarter-finals of the WTA 500 event in Austria boosted her ranking, only for injuries to dent her hopes of building on the platform she had created for herself.
The ITF World Tennis Tour provided Burrage with the stage to reboot her career in recent months and she made the most of the opportunities in front of her. She reached the semi-finals at W75 Glasgow in October ad backed that up with last-four appearances at a W35 event in France and W50 in Portugal, before finishing runner-up to 2022 Wimbledon semi-finalist Tatjana Maria on Slovakian hard courts at W75 Trnava.
The affable 25-year-old ended her season with a thrilling victory at W100 Dubai, delivering a timely confidence boost heading into 2025.
Burrage will use her protected WTA ranking to enter the Australian Open next month and says her ambitions for the new season have been boosted by her success on the ITF World Tennis Tour.
How do you reflect on your win in Dubai?
Jodie Burrage: I made the final the week before in Slovakia and before that, I had made it through to a couple of semi-finals in the weeks before, so I was happy to get over that hurdle and make a final. It was such a short turnaround after Slovakia that I was actually going out to Dubai to play a little bit of doubles with Freya Christie. I had kinda written off my hopes in the singles as I was pretty tired. In the last few months, I have played 30 singles matches or something like that on the ITF Tour, so I went to Dubai for some much-needed sunshine and I ended up winning the tournament.
How impressed have you been with the quality of competition on the ITF World Tennis Tour in recent weeks?
The opponents you are coming up against in the W75s and W100s are top 100 players who you could also meet in the first round of a Grand Slam. I played Tatjana Maria in the final of the W75 in Slovakia and I could also get her in the draw for the first round of the Australian Open, so the standard is very high. It means you need to be at your best to get through the early rounds as the level is improving all the time.
Prize money is rising on the ITF World Tennis Tour over the next two seasons - how important are those enhancements for the players?
The ITF events have improved so much in recent years. We are starting to get hospitality and hotels at the W75 and W100 and the ITF are doing a great job bringing that in. That helps the players out massively financially. Any increase in prize money at that level is also important. If you can do well at W100 level, the money is actually very good now. It's comparable to an early exit at a WTA Tour 250 event and that's why we are seeing so many good players in the draws for the ITF events.
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How tough is it for players outside the top 100 to fund their careers?
It's not easy. I am looking at finances going into 2025 and how I'm going to do things, so any prize money boosts we can get on the ITF Tour are massively helpful. This is another reason why I have started playing doubles as well. I'm thinking doubles will cover my accommodation cost and singles will cover coaching and travel expenses. I'm also fortunate to have great backing from sponsors and my clothing brand Penguin has been massively supportive of me this year, especially when I was out for so long with injury and not playing.
Sonay Kartal is a fellow Brit who has broken into the WTA Top 100 after a run of wins on the ITF World Tennis Tour - is she an inspiration for you heading into the new season?
Sonay has had an incredible year. I've had so many conversations with her and her coach about how she has done it. If you can keep picking up an average of 35 or 40 points every week, that will get you into the top 100. Katie Boulter is also a good friend of mine and she has had an unbelievable year. Staying inside the top 30 was a fantastic achievement. A couple of years ago she was in a similar situation to what I'm in now coming back from injury, so what she's done has been pretty inspiring and it gives me hope that there is a lot more to come for me next year.
What are your targets for 2025?
To stay fit, obviously, but I really want to try and get myself back into the top 100. My protected ranking will get me into a few big tournaments and that will give me a big chance to pick up some points. After the last few weeks on the ITF Tour, I have got a lot of confidence back. I believe I can beat players in the top 100 and around 150 again now and I feel like I deserve to be there again now.