Au Revoir Justine

Justine Henin has just announced her shock retirement from professional tennis, saying that it was the end to a "wonderful adventure". The news could not have come at a more improbable time. Justine is the three time defending champion at Roland Garros, set to begin in two weeks, and has dominated the tournament, winning the previous two years without dropping a single set. Even though she is going through a slump in form at the moment, she would have started as the hot favourite to win for the fourth time in a row. This is no longer to be. Justine will also leave undefended the Olympic gold medal she won at Athens in 2004, and any chance of a career grand slam. Her tenacity and ball-striking ability could never overcome the advantage the power hitters possessed at Wimbledon, though she did reach the final once, even taking a set off Venus Williams.

The advice given to most athletes is to bow out on top, on a high, no longer clinging to faded glory, but the drive and determination possessed by most top tier athletes often prevents this. They always believe that they can have one last shot at the slam they haven't won, that they can always rediscover the form they had shown in their heyday. This will not be the case for Justine - she retires at the very pinnacle, as the top ranked woman in the world, in an era where the woman's game could not be more competitive.

The question is, what could have prompted this? There is no one with any doubt that Justine still has so much left in her. At least a few more Grand Slams and probably even the elusive Wimbledon title. If there was any doubt as to her staying power at the top of women's tennis it was her ability against the power hitters - especially the two Williams sisters, but she had seemed to cross a major hurdle by defeating them both in eventually winning her second US Open title last year. The only other player to defeat both Williams sisters in a single Grand Slam tournament was Martina Hingis.

Justine now shares with Martina and fellow Belgium Kim Clijsters, the dubious honour of early retirement. In all three cases, injuries had a major role to play in them. Martina was forced out of the game due to persistent ankle ligament problems while Kim struggled with wrist injuries for much of the latter part of her career. Justine herself has been affected by injuries, notably the virus that hampered her for much of the early part of 2004, a fractured kneecap and a hamstring problem in 2005 , her retirement in the 2006 Australian Open due to stomach pain caused by the use of anti-inflammatories to treat a persistent shoulder problem, and other assorted niggling injuries that were to constantly plague her. There is little doubt that her retirement will only add fuel to the fire that the modern demands of tennis, and the packed tour calendar is causing female tennis players to burn out.

Her retirement is a great loss to the game of tennis. More than any other player, I greatly admired Justine for her courage, her tenacity and her pluck. She was an inspiration, a 1.66m giantess that refused to be dwarfed by a modern generation of big-grunting power hitters. Her one-handed backhand was truly poetry in motion, a beautiful deadly stroke, and her ability to serve at speeds equal to or greater than players a third larger continues to baffle and marvel me.

Justine has been determined to go her own way since the early stages of her career - breaking with her family (though now reconciled) over objections to her marriage with Pierre-Yves Hardenne. The shock announcement of her retirement is no different, and we can only wish her a fond au revoir, and all the best.