Nine months ago, Simona Halep stepped on court at her home tournament in Cluj-Napoca, not knowing it would be the last match of her professional tennis career.
Some players publicly plan their retirement well in advance. They go on a farewell tour, saying goodbye to fans at each stop, making sure they played at their favourite tournaments one last time.
Others set an end date, but keep it to themselves. They know exactly where they’ll be competing for the last time and share the news after the fact.
For some, the decision to pull the plug is a spontaneous one. They are suddenly hit with overwhelming certainty that they should hang up their racquets and walk away.
That is what happened to Halep during her 59-minute defeat to Lucia Bronzetti at the Transylvania Open in Cluj last February.
“I thought about it for a while, but it was not decided when I entered the court that in that match I would retire. But I felt like my place is not there any more,” Halep told The National in an interview at the WTA Finals in Riyadh last week.
“I felt physically, I was injured with my knee and I was in pain. So after I lost the first set, I made up my mind and I said, ‘I'm going to stop after this’.
“And then I went to my parents and I told them that
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