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MURRAY: BRITAIN’S ONLY HOPE

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Andy Murray is Britain’s only hope left in the 2012 Australian Open after a very disappointing opening day for the Brits in the tournament. The United Kingdom had a total of 6 players in the final draw, something that hadn’t happened since 1992. But all the players disappointed bitterly. Heather Watson, Laura Robson, James Ward and Elena Baltacha all lost their respective singles matches, while Anne Keothovang had to retire against Mona Barthel.

The Scot is the country’s only hope of proceeding further in the first Grand Slam tournament of the calendar year, but it’s a realistic hope nonetheless. Murray has been in good form and won the warm-up tournament, the Brisbane International. His first match is against world no. 84, Ryan Harrison of the United States. Murray is the fourth seed in the competition and hopes to be able to live up to the expectations of his fans all over the world. His current form is huge step up from his form a year back. His performance against the current leader, Novak Djokovic, was so poor that a journalist asked him if he was suffering from an injury to which his, frankly, pathetic performance could be attributed. That, however, was not the case as Murray revealed. The scot took a long time to recover from his defeat at the hands of the Serbian.

Murray has decided to step up to the challenge this year and try and advance till the finals. Murray is expected to meet Djokovic in the semi-finals and that will be one match that tennis fans will be dying to watch. He has got himself a new coach in the form of Ivan Lendl, and he hopes that together, they can figure out all the problems so that he can play better tennis overall. Tennis fans will be waiting to see how that works out.

Pete Sampras

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Pete Sampras is unarguably one of the greatest tennis players that have ever lived. During his 15 year career, he won 14 Grand Slam titles. Of these, he won the Wimbledon 7 times, a record shared with William Renshaw. Another record that he holds is for winning the US Open 5 times. This record is shared by Jimmy Connors and Roger Federer, both former world no. 1 players.

Even though he is now retired, he is held in extremely high esteem by players, both present and past. He was born in 1971 in Potomac, Maryland on 12th August to Georgia and Sammy Sampras. He was the third child in the family and showed a knack for athletics from a very early age. At the age of three, he found a disused tennis racket in the basement of their house, and spent hours hitting balls against the wall. The family moved to warmer climates, which allowed Pete to play more tennis. His childhood hero was Rod Laver, and at the age of 11, he met his childhood hero and also played with him. His talent for tennis was spotted by Peter Fischer, who was a tennis enthusiast and a pediatrician. Fischer was also Sampras’ first coach and changed his double-handed backhand to a single-handed backhand.

Sampras started playing professionally at the age of sixteen and cracked the junior top 100 in his first year of professional tennis. He started with a ranking of 893, but finished the year at no 97. In 1988, he improved his ranking to 81. In 1990, he finished the year with a ranking of 5, having beaten Andre Agassi, who was then ranked sixth, and Andres Gomez, who was ranked 18. The same year, he also won his first Grand Slam by beating Andre Agassi and becoming the youngest winner of the US Open at 19 years and 28 days.

In 1991, he was the defending champion of the US Open and lost to Jim Courier. Following his loss, Sampras said that he was more relieved than disappointed because the responsibility of defending the title was no longer on his shoulders. This statement caused massive controversy in the world’s tennis press, and Sampras had to face criticism from greats such as Jimmy Connors, and also from Jim Courier himself.

The period in Pete Sampras’ career from 1993 to 1996 was extremely eventful. He reached the semifinals of the Australian Open and the quarterfinals of the French Open, something that he did consecutively for the next three years. He also reached the world ranking no. 1 for the first time, but it was mired in controversy since he hadn’t won any Grand Slams in the recent past. However, he justified his ranking by winning the Wimbeldon that year for the first time. He went on to win the Wimbeldon 6 more times during his career, which made him the most successful male player in Wimbeldon history. Sampras’ best plating surface was quick grass, and this aided him in winning the Wimbeldon so many times.

He played his last tournament in 2002, and he signed off in style, winning the US Open by beating Andre Agassi in the finals.

Martina Navratilova

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Former women’s world no. 1, Billie Jean King, once said about her “She’s the greatest singles, doubles and mixed doubles player who’s ever lived”. She has won 18 singles Grand Slam titles, 31 doubles Grand Slam titles, which happens to be a record even to this day, and 10 mixed doubles Grand Slam titles. Yes, she is none other than the legendary Martina Navratilova.

Originally from Czechoslovakia, she was removed from citizenship when she asked the United States government for political asylum and was given temporary residency. This was in 1975, when Martina was girl of just 18 years of age. She became a full US citizen in 1981, but was also given back her Czech citizenship in 2008.

She was originally born Martina Subertova, in 1957, in the Czech capital, Prague. Her parents were separated when she was just a child of three. Her mother remarried, to Miroslav Navartilav. It is customary for women in Czechoslovakia to add the suffix “ova” to their surname. Her stepfather was also her first tennis coach. Her talent was on display from a very early age.

She won the Czechoslovakian national tennis tournament at the age of 15, and debuted at the US Lawn Tennis Association the very next year, but didn’t start playing professionally until 1975 when she moved to the United States. Although she didn’t turn professional until 1975, her first professional title came in Orlando in 1974. At the time, she was continuing with her studies. The very first year that she turned professional, she was in two Grand Slam finals. The first of these was the Australian Open, where she lost to Evonne Cawley. The next of these was the final of the French Open the very same year, when she lost to Chris Evert. Navratilova and Evert faced off again in the semi-finals of the US open that year, where Martina was defeated yet again. Following that, she went to the Immigration and Naturalization center in New York with a plea stating that she wanted to defect from Czechoslovakia and wanted to become an American citizen. She was given a green card within a month’s time.

Martina Navratilova won her first Grand Slam in 1978 at Wimbeldon, by defeating Chris Evert in three sets. After this win, she also got the ranking of world no. 1 for the first time, which she held on to, by winning the next Wimbeldon in 1979. She adopted the fitness and training regime from basketball star  , Nancy Lieberman. Following that, she became the most dominant female tennis player. During a period of three years from 1982 to 1984, she won only 6 singles matches. During that period, she also won the Australian Open, the US Open and the Wimbeldon multiple times.

“Tennis” magazine named her as the greatest female tennis player for the period 1965 to 2005. She was WTA Player of the Year for 7 years during the period 1978 to 1986. She really was one of the greatest tennis players the world has ever seen.