Novak Djokovic will be
looking to win a 19th Grand Slam title and a second Coupe des Mousquetaires
when he takes on first-time major finalist Stefanos Tsitsipas in the 2021
French Open men’s final. Will the world No 1’s experience trump the Greek’s
youthful exuberance at Roland Garros this evening ?
The French Open (Internationaux
de France de Tennis), also known as Roland Garros is a major tennis tournament held over two
weeks at the Stade Roland-Garros in Paris, France, beginning in late May each
year. The tournament and venue are named
after the French aviator Roland Garros. The French Open is the premier clay
court tennis championship tournament in the world.
Yesterday, it was
heartening to see the former powerstar ‘Martina Navratilova’ awarding the
trophy to the winner- Barbora Krejcikova. The Czech-American former professional tennis
player and coach was considered almost indefeatable during her play days, when
we watched the game. Navratilova won 18
Grand Slam singles titles, 31 major women's doubles titles, and 10 major mixed
doubles titles, for a combined total of 59 major titles, marking the Open Era
record for the most Grand Slam titles won by a single player.
The
Lenglen–Dewhurst match at the 1926 Wimbledon Championships was a second-round
match between French tennis player Suzanne Lenglen and British Ceylonese tennis
player Evelyn Dewhurst at the 1926 Wimbledon Championships, one of the four
Grand Slam tournaments. Lenglen, a six-time Wimbledon singles champion who was
undefeated in singles at the tournament, defeated Dewhurst in straight sets for
the last competitive win of her amateur career. The match had been rescheduled
three times. Lenglen withdrew from the tournament following the match and also
forfeited her amateur status a month after the tournament to become a
professional tennis player.
The match was enshrouded
in controversy after it needed to be rescheduled to accommodate the British
royal family. Lenglen's fallout with Queen
Mary and the British crowd was one of
the underlying factors in her leaving amateur tennis.
Pic credit : By Agence de
presse Meurisse - Bibliothèque nationale de France, Public Domain,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18618756
At Roland
Garros 2021, it was Barbora Krejcikova all the way. Outside the top 100 only nine months ago, the
Czech’s 6-1, 2-6, 6-4 victory over Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova capped a
magical run and a fitting tribute to the former Wimbledon champion. “I'm
extremely happy. It's a dream come true, for sure,” Krejcikova said. “I'm just
really happy that I was able to handle it as I did, that mentally I think that
was the biggest key. “I spoke with my psychologist again and we spoke about it
a lot. I just knew that as soon as I'm going to enter the court, I'm just not
going to be panicking anymore. That was actually happening… I mean, it's
something I have always dreamed about, winning here – my first doubles title,
then some [other Grand Slam] doubles title, then winning the mixed ones.
In what was only her fifth
Grand Slam singles main draw, the 25-year-old Czech said she already felt right
at home on the biggest stadiums, as a result of those two majors in doubles and
three in mixed doubles. Her opponent, Pavlyuchenkova, had reached six major
quarter-finals before and was appearing in her 52nd Grand Slam main draw, but
her superior experience on the singles arena ultimately had no definitive
influence on the result.
A new women's
singles major champion was assured for the sixth year in succession on Court
Philippe-Chatrier and even after three match points had slipped her grasp,
Krejcikova never felt alone as she became the first Czech Roland-Garros winner
since Hana Mandlikova 40 years ago. She
vowed her pragmatic approach to life on and off the court would not change a
scrap in the aftermath. It was an outlook of which she knew the similarly
down-to-earth Novotna would be proud. Novotna – a former Wimbledon champion –
succumbed to ovarian cancer in 2017, three years after she agreed to come on
board as coach. “She wasn't acting like she won so many titles, that she's
somebody special. She's always acting like a normal person… She always told me
like, ‘Doesn't matter how many titles you're going to win, you always have to
come and say hello, please, and thank you. It's very important to behave very
nice'.
After that handsome win - Barbora Krejcikova received Coupe
Suzanne-Lenglen from Czech-born
legend, Martina Navratilova, who said - “I knew she was a champion, she has a
lot of courage, because in 2014 when you found out that Jana moved back to Brno
you had the courage to go knock on her door and ask her for help,” Navratilova
said on court. “What made you think it was OK to do that? What gave you that
courage?” “My mum,” Krejcikova quipped. Now, Krejcikova has the opportunity to
replicate what Frenchwoman Mary Pierce achieved in 2000, winning both singles
and doubles in the same year at Roland-Garros. Krejickova will find out on
Sunday, when she teams up with compatriot Katerina Siniakova to face Iga
Swiatek and Bethanie Mattek-Sands for the trophy.
The Suzanne-Lenglen cup is awarded to the women’s singles
champion since 1979 and bears the name of an emblematic French champion.
Suzanne Lenglen (1899-1938) won Roland-Garros six times. Her modern style,
elegance and flair were what inspired the Musketeers. The trophy is almost identical, minus a few
details, to the cup offered at the time by the City of Nice to Suzanne Lenglen,
and which is housed in the National Sports Museum.
Suzanne Rachel Flore
Lenglen (1899 – 1938) was a French tennis player. She was ranked as the
inaugural world No. 1 from 1921 to 1926, winning 8 Grand Slam singles titles
and 21 in total, as well as 10 World Championship titles. She won six Wimbledon
singles titles, including five in a row from 1919 to 1923, and also won triple
crowns at the first two open French Championships in 1925 and 1926. In doubles,
she was undefeated with her regular partner Elizabeth Ryan, highlighted by
another six titles at Wimbledon. Because of her immense popularity and
prominent social acquaintances, Lenglen is recognised as the first female
athlete to become a global sport celebrity. She was also the first leading amateur
to turn professional, and was ranked as the greatest women's tennis player from
the amateur era in the 100 Greatest of All Time series. That rescheduling of match in Wimbledon 1926 –
her fallout with Queen Mary and the British crowd were the underlying factors
in her leaving amateur tennis.
Interesting !
13th June 2021
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