Emma Navarro asked if she could give her dad a shoutout during her on-court interview after reaching the US Open semi-final.
The 13th seed pulled off an incredible comeback in the second set of her match against Paula Badosa, winning the last six games to come through 6-2 7-5.
Navarro’s father Ben is worth £1.1billion ($1.5billion) according to Forbes and owns several professional tennis tournaments, including the Cincinnati Open, an ATP and WTA 1000 event.
The American broke new ground at her home Grand Slam tournament, reaching the semis of a Major for the first time. It’s only been a couple of years since Navarro left college to become a full-time professional tennis player and she paid tribute to her closest supporters while reflecting on her journey.
“It means so much to me. My coach and I, we’ve been together since I think I was 14 or 15 so it’s been eight years now and we’ve done a lot of great work together,” Navarro said, addressing the Arthur Ashe Stadium crowd.
“So thank you for everything you do, your dedication to this journey and making me into the player I am.” Interviewer Rennae Stubbs then went to ask the next question but Navarro wanted to give her dad a shoutout.
“Can I say one more thing?” Navarro asked. “You can say whatever you want,” Stubbs assured her. The 23-year-old then turned her attention to her father. She continued: “I want to also thank my dad because I think he saw a vision from the time I was really young.
“He knew maybe I was a little bit ADHD or something to be sitting in a classroom or in a nine-to-five and I think he saw something in me from a young age. So thanks dad for sending me on this journey.”
Navarro also confessed that she had a feeling she would turn things around in the second set despite trailing Badosa 1-5. “Yeah, after I got it back to 5-2 I kind of had a little bit of an inkling that it might be two sets and I just wanted to stay really tough and stick in there and even if I did lose the second set, I wanted to kind of set the tone for the third set,” she added.
