"Serena & Venus Williams didn't linger to have a chat... Grigor Dimitrov was ignoring me completely" - Ex tennis pro laments social cliques on tour

Ex tennis pro Conor Niland opened up about the prevalence of social cliques on the tour in a recent interview, revealing that one's ranking often determined their social status among other tennis players. As examples, the Irishman shed light on his interactions with stars like Serena Williams, Venus Williams and Grigor Dimitrov and how they turned out.

Niland is a former World No. 129, toiling away for the most of his career on the ATP Challenger Tour. The highest ranked tennis player from Ireland, he made two Grand Slam main draw appearances (one each at Wimbledon and the US Open) before retiring in 2012. In terms of prize money, the 42-year-old amassed a little less than a quarter of $1 million over the course of a seven-year-old long stint in professional tennis.

Speaking to The Guardian in a column, Niland revealed that top players behave starkly different when interacting with others based on the rank, recalling an instant where the Williams sisters preferred talking to a higher-ranked player over him.

"Your ranking determined your social status on tour. The guy ranked at number 90 in the world doesn’t get as warm a handshake from the Slam champion as the guy ranked at 20."

"The Williams sisters didn’t linger to have a chat with me when Serena and I were 16-year-olds training at the Bollettieri tennis academy in Florida, but a girl I hit with who was ranked 50 in the world did stop and talk. Where a player sits in the hierarchy determines how they act, and everyone knows it," Niland said.

Conor Niland also opened up about his experience dealing with Grigor Dimitrov, recalling how the Bulgarian sought him out during his early days when he was an up-and-coming player.

However, Niland explained, as the years passed and Dimitrov rose rapidly up the ranks to become a top 20 player, he started ignoring him completely.

"(Grigor Dimitrov and I) practised together for the week. “Hey,” he shouted to me across the court during one hit, his eyes smiling. He went into an impression of my stiff-looking walk, then picked up two balls and did an impression of my serve. It was very accurate. And funny," Niland said.

"Several years later, I watched Maria Sharapova, now officially his girlfriend, cheering him on courtside at Wimbledon. I bumped into him occasionally, but his greeting to me became less and less effusive as his ranking climbed higher. By the time he had cracked the top 20, he was ignoring me completely," he added.

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"I made virtually no lasting friendships" - Conor Niland on his lonely life on the tennis tour

Conor Niland

Conor Niland also shed light on the loneliness that pervades life on the tennis tour, stating that he made no lasting friendships with any of his fellow players despite them all belonging to the same age category.

In fact, Niland emphasized that life on the ATP Futures circuit, one rung lower than the Challenger Tour in the men's tennis ecosystem, is even more eccentric, housing players who barely make a living off the sport.

"I made virtually no lasting friendships on tour through my seven years, despite coming across hundreds of players my own age living the same life as my own. Those destined for greatness, the teenagers who join having won Grand Slams on the junior circuit, don’t hang around the Futures for long," Niland wrote.

"They win four or five events and then jump right to the Challenger Tour in less than a year, often while still a junior. They are in the minority, however, and the Futures tour housed some eccentric souls," he added.