Sonay Kartal tattoos: British tennis player's body art explained as she plays Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova at Wimbledon

The tennis player, who grew up training with Emma Raducanu, is one of the breakout stars of this year’s tournament and is competing in the fourth round against 34-year-old Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. She is the last remaining British woman in the tournament.

At 5ft 4in, Kartal is the shortest player left in the women’s draw, and is ranked 51st in the world, although this is likely to change for the better after Wimbledon. As well as her energetic game, one of Kartal’s most distinctive features is her body art - she has 14 tattoos, and seems to enjoy talking about them.

Sonay Kartal’s 14 tattoos

Bee - left forearm

During the French Open last month, Kartal said she had had to reschedule a tattoo appointment, which clashed with her doubles match. When she returned to Britain, she said the pair had had a bee inked on their forearms - this was Kartal’s 14th.

“Me and my sister got a matching bumblebee,” she said at Queen’s. “I gave her the choice. She said, ‘Will you get tattoo with me?’ I said yeah. Came off after my first match and she had got the bumblebee. So I had to hold my word, and yeah, I went in the end of the week to get that one.”

Dog pawprint- back of left bicep

She says that this is her favourite body art. It’s a tribute to her first dog, a golden retriever named Chester, who died two years ago. “I bought some doggy ink and got his paw print downsized, got it tattooed and put into a little picture on the back of my arm,” she said.

Eagle - left forearm

Kartal’s dad from Turkey, and Kartal means eagle in Turkish.

Snake - right forearm

Kartal says she got this done just because she liked it. She told The Sun: "The snake, I was just scrolling through my phone and saw that one as well."

2022 - left wrist

This marks her breakthrough year on the women’s tour. “The date, it says 2022, I did all the four Grand Slams my first time,” she explained.

Butterfly - right bicep

The butterfly is always visible when she plays.

Checkered heart - right forearm

This is one she has not spoken about publically, but is quite obvioyus when she plays.

Quotes

She has "The show must go on" and "Time is everything we have and don’t" - about latter she said last month at the pre-Wimbledon Eastbourne tournament: ““I forgot about that one. It’s just a quote I like to live by. Sometimes I think I can get a bit stressy and stuff, so for me, it kind of just tells me it's like to calm down, just to be in the moment a little bit.” .

Knuckles

She also has several small tattoos on her knuckles - at least four of them - but has said: “These ones kind of have no meaning. The knuckle ones just trying to be stylish maybe.”

Future plans

She is planning more tattoos - and says she would welcome ideas. “Yeah, I mean, I'm open to suggestions. Like if people throw me some good ideas, I will definitely consider them. 90 per cent [chance] I would end up going with one of those ideas.

“I would get something that people are connected to Wimbledon and understand Wimbledon, they would understand. Maybe not necessarily to somebody not involved in tennis. I would like to get something related to Wimbledon.”