The era of the teenaged tennis phenom is over and will never return thanks to new age-eligibility rules in women’s tennis.There is unlikely to be another 16 year old win a Grand Slam or top the world rankings like Monica Seles or Martina Hingis did.

But even as we wait for a 21 year old Caroline Wozniacki to win her first Grand Slam or another 21 year old Petra Kvitova to unleash the full potential within her and become a dominant champion, it’s typical for tennis fans and writers to look ahead and get excited about the next wave of stars.

Over the past week, two teenagers – highly touted and capable of being world beaters one day – grabbed the headlines as they secured wild cards into the Australian Open in January. Wild cards were once the birthright of prodigious teens. Not anymore.

15 year old Australian Ashleigh Barty and 16 year old American Madison Keys both had to earn their wild cards – grinding their way through a play off organized by their respective national tennis associations.

Barty had to battle it out against 15 of her countrywomen for the one wild card – the field included former top 40 player Casey Dellacqua, who had won a record breaking 30 matches in a row on the ITF Tour since September. Barty beat Dellacqua in her first match in the play-off and didn’t look back after that.

The 15 year old has been seen as one of the future stars of the game ever since she won the Wimbledon junior singles title in July and is currently no. 2 in the ITF junior rankings. She is also an indigenous Australian, like former Wimbledon champion Evonne Goolagong, who speaks very highly of the teen. “I watched her play during the Australian Open,” said Goolagong, “I just saw one game and I thought, ‘that’s it, she’s got it. It was just fantastic for me to see because I was never one during my whole career to actually watch tennis until Ash came along. Now I watch.”

One of the girls Barty beat during her Wimbledon run was the 16 year old Keys, who trains at the Evert Academy in Florida. Barty won that encounter 6-3, 6-7, 6-4 – an omen perhaps of bigger battles to come in the future. Keys came through an eight player field that included 20 year old Coco Vandeweghe, ranked inside the top 100 earlier this year, and Melanie Oudin, once a 17 year old highly rated teen herself who has since seen her confidence and ranking spiral down to the edge of oblivion.

Keys also won a similar play off held by the USTA for the US Open wild card and she made the most of that opportunity – beating veteran Jill Craybass in the first round and nearly taking out the seeded Czech Lucie Safarova.

Keys and Barty won’t be the only teens in Melbourne. They will be joined by 19 year olds Christina McHale (American) and Heather Watson (Britain) and 17 year old Sloane Stephens (American) – all of whom got direct entry into the main draw thanks to their top 100 ranking.

None of them are ready yet to win a Slam but these teenagers will certainly be making plenty of noise Down Under.

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