“It wasn’t much of a contract,” Maria Sharapova recalls her first brand endorsement in the early days of her career


“It wasn’t much of a contract,” Maria Sharapova  recalls her first brand endorsement in the early days of her career

Maria Sharapova - FirstSportz

Retired tennis legend Maria Sharapova is one of the greatest players of all time and played a crucial role in revolutionizing women’s tennis. She has also been one of the most beautiful players who drew numerous endorsements and brands to her kitty. She recalled the time when she signed her first brand endorsement while she was quite young.

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The former world number one from Russia faced one of the most difficult phases in her career of almost two decades when she failed to pass a drug test and was provisionally suspended from competitive tennis. After further investigation,she was suspended for two years. But it was reduced to fifteen months for unknowingly taking the substance with no ill intentions.

The Russian player made her professional debut in 2001 at an age of 13. She created history when she reached the finals of the Australian Open in 2002. She had been the youngest girl ever to reach the final of the Australian Open junior championship at 14 years and 9 months. Soon, she grabbed the limelight and signed her first deal with the sports brand called Nike. She stated that it was a small contract and had faced issues regarding her fittings since the brand did not cater to the needs of the younger players at that time.

It wasn’t much of a contract. I mean it was a very small contract and I was still, I was still a junior, and Nike signed me. And I was about 11 years old, which is pretty crazy to look back. But at the time it wasn’t much of a contract,” said the former World No 1 during an interview.

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Maria Sharapova’s net worth from her brand endorsements

Maria Sharapova - FirstSportz
Maria Sharapova – FirstSportz

Maria Sharapova won her first Grand Slam title at Wimbledon in the year 2004 when she was just 17 years of age. She is one of the few female players to have completed a calendar slam. The 5-time Grand Slam champion announced her retirement in 2020 owing to her constant injuries. She had not performed her best game of tennis as her last major singles title win was at the French Open in 2014.

In the past 11 consecutive years, she is the highest paid female athlete and earned around $285 million including prize money since she turned pro in 2001. Sharapova won 645 singles matches and lost 171 throughout her career. She also won 16 singles titles and earned a total of $38,777,962 prize money in her career. Moreover, the 2-time French Open champion also earned an estimated $9.5 million per year from her various brand endorsements such as Nike, Avon, Porsche, Evian, and Tag Heuer, among others.

Apart from being one of the greatest tennis players, she is also a successful businesswoman. The former US Open champion has shown her interest to venture into NFTs and is constantly getting into the crypto world after building ‘Sugarpova’ from scratch. She even plans of including women in Web3 as she believes it could be a strong area for her to invest in the long term.

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