Bushmiller
21st January 2012, 12:57 PM
With the australian tennis in full swing :rolleyes: I was wondering if there might be a few tennis fans out there and my question is what was the greatest tennis match you ever saw?
I don't really follow tennis closely nowadays and I hardly know the players names, but there was a time when I did.
For me the stand out match was the Pancho Gonzales vs Charlie Paserell epic of 1969 at Wimbledon.
To set the scene, the merging of professional and amateur status had only just occured the year before and some of the greats had returned such as Laver and Rosewell; Also Gonzales who had never played in the grand slam events as an amateur. Arguably Gonzales at 41 years of age was well past his tennis use by date.
However the match between him and Pasarell captured the world of tennis for two days. Both men were natural atheletes, but Pasarell was 10 years younger and in fact Gonzales had been Pasarell's coach.
It was in the days before the tie break which was introduced to prevent these protracted matches. Gonzales won after five gruelling sets 22-24,1-6,16-14,6-3,11-9. He "threw" the second set in disgust when the umpires would not suspend play for bad light, but play was eventually suspended and resumed on the second day. Gonzales went from bad boy on the first day to crowd pleaser on the second. He saved 7 match points against him during the marathon of over 5 hours.
Do any of you have some other epics? Vids/links would be good if available. There was nothing unfortunately for this contest.
Regards
Paul
I don't really follow tennis closely nowadays and I hardly know the players names, but there was a time when I did.
For me the stand out match was the Pancho Gonzales vs Charlie Paserell epic of 1969 at Wimbledon.
To set the scene, the merging of professional and amateur status had only just occured the year before and some of the greats had returned such as Laver and Rosewell; Also Gonzales who had never played in the grand slam events as an amateur. Arguably Gonzales at 41 years of age was well past his tennis use by date.
However the match between him and Pasarell captured the world of tennis for two days. Both men were natural atheletes, but Pasarell was 10 years younger and in fact Gonzales had been Pasarell's coach.
It was in the days before the tie break which was introduced to prevent these protracted matches. Gonzales won after five gruelling sets 22-24,1-6,16-14,6-3,11-9. He "threw" the second set in disgust when the umpires would not suspend play for bad light, but play was eventually suspended and resumed on the second day. Gonzales went from bad boy on the first day to crowd pleaser on the second. He saved 7 match points against him during the marathon of over 5 hours.
Do any of you have some other epics? Vids/links would be good if available. There was nothing unfortunately for this contest.
Regards
Paul