Monica Seles, Rod Laver, Maureen Connolly and Bjorn Borg: Four Lost Chapters

By
at Internationaled.org

Published: January 18, 2011

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Imagine you came across a tennis record book from an alternate reality, one in which certain events never happened. I’ve often wondered how different today’s records might appear as a result. What if f Bjorn Borg had never retired at 26 and began to play with modern racquets? What if ‘open’ tennis had begun in 1960 rather than 1968? Here, I suggest four incidents that I feel had a profound effect on the game’s future.

Monica Seles

At the peak of her powers in 1993, Monica Seles was amassing grand slam trophies on a regular basis, was world number one and largely enjoying domination over the mighty Steffi Graf. Her pugnacious game was never too easy on the eye or ear, but the original queen of ‘screechers’ was a relentlessly accurate baseliner who looked set to demolish opponents for some time to come.  This all came to a shuddering stop with the terrifying swish of a blade at a tournament in Hamburg in 1993. The deranged spectator responsible for the potentially lethal assault derailed what looked likely to be one of the greatest female tennis careers of all. Although Seles eventually recovered and returned to the game, she was never quite the same force again despite winning one more major title. The skills were still there but it seemed that something intangible had been left behind on that terrible day in Hamburg.

It seems likely, despite her already impressive collection of nine, that she would have won many more majors, including a first Wimbledon title. Graf’s career total of 22 major titles would likely have been reduced by four or five and her rivalry with Seles could have become comparable to that of Evert and Navratilova.

Rod Laver

For a period of time in the ‘swinging sixties’ Rodney  ‘the Rocket’ Laver, the greatest player of his era and one of the greatest of all time was not welcome through t...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Tennis

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