Stephanie Devillé (born 24 July 1976) is a former professional

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...

player from Belgium.

Biography

Born in Antwerp, Devillé began playing tennis at the age of six and was coached by Christophe Delzenne. She was a member of the Belgian team which won the 1992 World Youth Cup (now known as Junior Fed Cup), along with

Laurence Courtois Laurence Courtois (born 18 January 1976) is a former professional female tennis player from Belgium. Courtois, who was born in Kortrijk, won four doubles titles on the WTA Tour The WTA Tour is a worldwide top-tier tennis tour for women organ ...

and

Nancy Feber Nancy Feber (born 5 February 1976) is a retired Belgian tennis player. As a junior player, she won four Grand Slam titles – one in singles and three in doubles. Feber won French Open twice, in 1992 and 1993, both times in doubles with Laurence ...

. In 1996 she had her breakthrough year on tour. After winning ITF tournaments in Bordeaux and Budapest, she made her WTA Tour main draw debut in

Palermo Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan ...

, as a qualifier. She defeated

Sandra Cecchini Anna-Maria "Sandra" Cecchini (; born 27 February 1965) is a retired professional tennis player from Italy. Career Cecchini turned professional in 1984. She won 12 singles and 11 doubles titles on the WTA Tour. She had career wins over Chris Ev ...

in the first round, then was rewarded her second round match against Irina Spîrlea when the Romanian was defaulted for swearing in the first game of the deciding set. Her run ended with a three-set loss to Jana Kandarr in the quarter-finals. She improved on that performance by making the semi-finals of the Styrian Open later in the season, then made it through qualifying at the 1996 US Open to feature in the main draw of a grand slam for the first time. She won her third ITF title of the year at Sedona and improved her ranking from 279 to 74 by the end of the season. At the

1997 Australian Open The 1997 Australian Open was a tennis tournament played on outdoor hard courts at Melbourne Park in Melbourne in Victoria in Australia. It was the 85th edition of the Australian Open and was held from 13 through 26 January 1997. Prior to the ...

she overcame

Denisa Chládková Denisa Chládková (born 8 February 1979) is a former professional tennis player from the Czech Republic. Life and career Chládková did not win any WTA Tour titles, but she is probably best remembered for reaching the Wimbledon quarterfinal ...

in the first round, 8–6 in the third set, then suffered the disappointment of having to retire hurt against

Arantxa Sánchez Vicario Aránzazu Isabel María "Arantxa" Sánchez Vicario (; born 18 December 1971) is a Spanish former List of WTA number 1 ranked singles tennis players, world No. 1 tennis player. She won 14 Grand Slam (tennis), Grand Slam titles: four in singles, ...

in the second round. With only one game completed, Devillé went down with a sprained ankle and was unable to carry on. She didn't return to action until March and that month reached her career best ranking of 61. From 1998 she played mainly on the ITF circuit. Devillé has commentated on tennis for

RTBF The ''Radio-télévision belge de la Communauté française'' (RTBF, ''Belgian Radio-television of the French Community'', branded as rtbf.be) is a public service broadcaster delivering radio and television services to the French-speaking Commu ...

and also coaches tennis locally.

ITF Circuit finals

Singles: 11 (8–3)

Doubles: 1 (1–0)

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Deville, Stephanie 1976 births Living people Belgian female tennis players Sportspeople from Antwerp 20th-century Belgian women