Junri Namigata
Early life and amateur career. Namigata was born in Koshigaya, Saitama Prefecture and started playing tennis when she was six years old. She completed elementary school at a school in Koshigaya and won a regional tournament when in the third grade. She attended Fujimura Girls' Junior High School and Horikoshi High School in Tokyo. In September 1997, when still in junior high school, she made her first appearance in an ITF doubles tournament. In her first year of high school, she reached the round of 16 at the All Japan Tennis Championship and won the All Japan Junior  Championship title in her final year of high school. She enrolled in the School of Social Sciences at Waseda University and in 2001 won the intercollegiate doubles title, was runner-up in the singles title, and was a member of the Waseda team that took out the team event. In 2004, she won the intercollegiate singles title and also won her first ITF doubles titles in October. Professional career. Namigata turned professional in August 2005, after graduating from Waseda in April of the same year. Her goal was to finish her first year as a professional ranked in the top  200; she finished 2006 ranked 162 in singles. The first of her six singles titles came in July 2007. In July 2014, Namigata won her first WTA event, the doubles tournament of the inaugural Jiangxi International Open, partnering with Chuang Chia-Jung. 2014 was the most successful year of her career thus far, winning three ITF doubles titles and her first singles title since 2010. She finished the year ranked 196 in singles and 145 in doubles, returning to the top 200 in each category for the first time since 2011. Grand Slam appearances. In singles, Namigata has qualified for  two Grand Slam tournaments so far. At the 2011 Australian Open, she lost to Canadian Rebecca Marino in the first round. Later in the same year, she lost in the first round of the French Open to Aleksandra Wozniak. In doubles, she qualified for the 2008 Wimbledon tournament with fellow Japanese player Ayumi Morita, losing in the first round to Ekaterina Makarova and Selima Sfar. In January 2017, Namigata and Chan Chin-wei received wildcard entry into the Australian Open, losing in the first round to Tatjana Maria and Pauline Parmentier. Fed Cup. Namigata represented Japan in the Asia/Oceania  group of the 2011 Fed Cup.