London: Switzerland's Timea Bacsinszky says her time as a lowly hotel intern provided a valuable life-lesson that has fuelled her run to the Wimbledon quarter-finals.


Timea Bacsinszky. Pic/AFP 

Frustrated by a succession of injuries and struggling with a difficult relationship with her father, Bacsinszky was at a low ebb when she turned her back on tennis to start working in a hotel two years ago. But the experience of an industry that brought her into close contact with the general public made her realise how fortunate she had been to enjoy the cosseted existence of a tennis pro.