Elena Sergeevna Baltacha (; 14 August 1983 – 4 May 2014) was a Ukrainian-born British professional tennis player. Being a four-time winner of the AEGON Awards, she was also a long-term British No. 1, a position she held intermittently from 2002 to 2012. However, as a result of her absence from competition due to knee surgery, she dropped down the world rankings and at the time of her retirement on 18 November 2013, she was ranked as the world No. 221 and British No. 6. Her career-high ranking of world No. 49 was achieved in September 2010.
Over the course of her career, she won 11 ITF singles titles (five $25k, two $50k, two $75k, and two $100k) and four ITF doubles titles (all $25k). She was also a runner-up in three ITF events in singles and four in doubles. In 2010, Baltacha had victories over top 10-players, including two victories over Li Na (the second of which came via retirement) and one against Francesca Schiavone, who at the time was the reigning French Open champion. In 2011, Baltacha won her highest ranked tournament on the ITF Circuit, the Nottingham Challenge.
Baltacha was diagnosed with liver cancer in January 2014, just a few weeks after her marriage to tennis coach Nino Severino. She died on 4 May 2014, aged 30.
Biography
Born in Kyiv, Ukraine, Baltacha moved with her family following a transfer of football clubs by her professional footballer father, Sergei. It was only couple of years before the Chernobyl disaster near Kyiv when Elena was only two years of age. He represented the Soviet Union and from 1988 to 1995 played in the United Kingdom for Ipswich Town, St Johnstone and Inverness Caledonian Thistle. Her mother Olga was a sportswoman. Her brother Sergei played football for St Mirren and Millwall.
After arriving at Heathrow Airport on 13 January 1989, Baltacha moved to Ipswich where her father was to play football for the next year before moving to Perth, Scotland, where she grew up and spent some of her teenage years, before moving to Paisley, Scotland, and attending Castlehead High School.
Resident in Ipswich, on 8 December 2013, a month after her retirement from tennis, she married her coach Niño Severino, a retired professional tennis coach turned multi-sports specialist in mental and movement training coach, who also works with Ipswich Town F.C. and in coaching martial arts athletes. In 2010, the couple formed the Elena Baltacha Academy of Tennis, which is still run by Niño and based around the facilities at Ipswich Sports Club, where she trained during her career.
At the age of 19, she was diagnosed with the liver condition primary sclerosing cholangitis and in June 2010, she became patron of the Children's Liver Disease Foundation. Baltacha was diagnosed with liver cancer in January 2014. She died from the disease on 4 May 2014 at the age of 30. Several players paid tribute to Baltacha on Twitter including Grand Slam champions Martina Navratilova, Serena Williams, Billie Jean King, Maria Sharapova, Victoria Azarenka, Kim Clijsters, Petra Kvitová, Marion Bartoli, Chris Evert, Sam Stosur and Svetlana Kuznetsova. A host of ATP and WTA tennis players past and present came together on the centre court at the Madrid Open as a mark of respect for Baltacha. Baltacha's funeral took place on 19 May and was attended by Tim Henman, Annabel Croft, Laura Robson, Jo Durie and Judy Murray among others. Mourners were asked to wear bright colours instead of black and to donate to Rally for Bally rather than buying flowers. The money was to be split equally between the Royal Marsden Cancer Charity and the Elena Baltacha Academy of Tennis, which she set up to help disadvantaged children take up the sport. Baltacha is interred in the Ipswich Millennium Cemetery.
In May 2015, it was announced that the trophy at the Nottingham Open was to be named the "Elena Baltacha trophy" in her honour.
