The all-white dress code; the formal announcement of names; no on-court advertisements; and, of course, strawberries and cream. What about on-court memories? Here are seven of the greatest moments in the history of this tournament, which begins tomorrow.
The decision in 1991 to hold matches on the middle Sunday.
Czech Republic’s Jana Novotna weeping on the shoulder of the Duchess of Kent after losing to Steffi Graf in 1993.
Martina Navratilova, in partnership with Leander Paes, winning the mixed doubles title, which was also her last title.
The match between John Isner and Nicholas Mahut in 2010 which, till date, is the longest match ever played at 11 hours and five minutes.
1975: Colour is in short supply at Wimbledon. It is a must for players to turn out in all-white attires. For officials and ball boys, it was always green and purple until navy blue and cream uniforms were chosen in the mid-2000s. But the biggest colour statement ever made here still belongs to Arthur Ashe. When he beat Jimmy Connors in the 1975 singles final, he became the first African-American to triumph. He spent much of his career and the years after it trying to dismantle the barriers of poverty, racism and social stereotyping. Unsurprisingly the ATP’s Humanitarian of the Year award is named after him.
1980: Think of Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe, the mind always travels back to the 1980 final and to that unforgettable fourth-set tie-breaker. McEnroe saved five match points, won the 22-minute affair 18-16 and stretched the match to five sets before losing to hand Borg his fifth Wimbledon title. But more than that it signalled the making of McEnroe as a champion and sowed the first seeds of doubt in “Ice-Cool” Borg’s mind. The match, in its entirety, is still arguably the greatest match ever played.
1985: Aged 17, Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras and Roger Federer all lost in the first round at Wimbledon. But another 17-year-old won the men’s singles crown in 1985: Boris Becker. The public had little knowledge about who he was. The players knew him as ‘Boom Boom’, the overgrown kid in tight shorts. But, when he beat Kevin Curren in the final, he became the youngest-ever and the first unseeded male to clinch the title. “It was such an extraordinary record that people looked at me like I was from Planet Mars,” Becker told The New York Times in 2010. “They said I couldn’t have been human to do that. I get these looks, still, now.”
1988: From 1982 to 1987, Martina Navratilova owned Wimbledon, so much so, that a reporter from The New York Times described her “as much of a fixture on Centre Court as the Duke and Duchess of Kent (the ones who hand over the trophies). In 1988, though, she ran into a 19-year old West German in Steffi Graf and lost. For Graf, it was the second stop in her journey towards the ‘Golden Slam’ (winning all four Slams and the Olympic Gold medal in the same year) and for tennis a passing of the torch moment.
2001: For a full decade, Goran Ivanisevic was everybody’s second favourite. He was an ace-machine and had the unique ability to dish out a second serve which was more powerful and more accurate than the first. He was also a three-time finalist at Wimbledon. But at the start of 2001, he contemplated retirement after struggling with a shoulder injury. Going into the Championship he was ranked in the 120s which couldn’t even guarantee a direct entry. But what unfolded was a fairytale. His odds were 150/1. But he became the only male entrant to win Wimbledon as a wild card.
2001: The early 2000s were the sunset years of Sampras’ career. So, when a 19-year-old Federer beat the seven-time champion in the fourth round in 2001, it signalled a change of guard. Federer was dubbed the next grass-court king and he lived up to it winning seven Wimbledons. But it also heralded a different kind of change. In that match there were 254 serve-and-volley points. When Federer beat Andy Roddick in the 2009 final over five sets, there were 11. In those intervening years, an art was lost, though for no fault of Federer.
2008: Winning the French Open and Wimbledon in the same year is perhaps the toughest of asks. The successful transition from the slow and bouncy clay in Paris to the fast and slippery grass in London, all in a matter of two weeks, is considered next to impossible. That Borg managed do it thrice in succession (1978, 79 and 80) is the reason why he is right up there in the pantheon of greats. That list had a new member in 2008 when Rafael Nadal defeated Federer to become the first man since Borg to achieve the feat. A dominant clay-courter had beaten a master of the grass court, ushering in the era of the all-courters.
