Wozniacki dazzles tennis crowd with diamond ring

By: 11 years ago

In this photo released by Tennis Australia, Denmark’s Caroline Wozniacki shows her new engagement ring as she signs her autograph for fans at the Australian Open tennis championship in Melbourne, Australia, Monday, Jan. 13, 2014. Wozniacki recently announced her engagement to Northern Ireland golfer Rory McIlroy. AP

MELBOURNE, Australia—The searing sunlight wasn’t the only thing sparkling on Caroline Wozniacki’s court, where the crowds got a glimpse of her very large, brand new diamond engagement ring from golfer Rory McIlroy.

Wozniacki had tweeted a picture of the ring after McIlroy popped the question on New Year’s Eve in Sydney. But she provided a few more details Tuesday after winning her first-round match at the Australian Open, where temperatures for her morning match topped 38 Celsius and got hotter later in the day.

The former Number 1-ranked player raced to a 6-0, 6-2 win over Lourdes Dominguez Lino, then sat on her bench, pulled the ring from her tennis bag and slipped it on her finger. An on-court interviewer asked her to hold it up for the crowd and recount the proposal, which she said was very traditional.

“He asked my parents,” a beaming Wozniacki said. “He went down on one knee.”

And he chose her favorite number in carats, she said, which explains the ring’s impressive size.

Later on, Wozniacki was asked what her favorite number was.

“It’s also the Chinese lucky number,” she said, smiling. “It’s eight.”

The 23-year-old Wozniacki and her 24-year-old fiance are one of the top power couples in sports. They first began seeing each other in the summer of 2011, shortly after McIlroy won his first major with a record-setting performance in the United States Open at Congressional. They confirmed they were dating a few months later.

Winning a first major has been one of Wozniacki’s goals for years.

The Danish player was ranked No. 1 for a total of 67 weeks, finishing with the year-end top ranking in 2010 and 2011, when critics joked she was the best player on the WTA Tour to have never won a Grand Slam title.

Wozniacki, now ranked 10th, said she didn’t expect marriage would change her professional priorities and, if anything, would bring a new “calmness” to their lives.

“We know what we want, and it just gives us even more time to focus on our careers,” she said, adding that McIlroy’s career is bound to last longer than hers. “Obviously, he’s going to retire later than me. Golf you can play until you’re 50.”

“For me right now, I try to focus on the Grand Slams,” added Wozniacki, who was a 2011 semifinalist in Melbourne and a two-time semifinalist at the U.S. Open. “That’s what I’m missing on my resume. So that’s obviously what I would like to achieve.”

Wozniacki faces Christina McHale in the second round.