Laurie's Tennis articles

Last week we took a look at the best male players. Now let’s take a look at the best female players since Hard Courts became an important feature of Professional Tennis. All of the players here are current or former world number 1 champions. Showing once again that to be the very best, you have to excel on hard courts because it’s played so often throughout the Tennis season, both indoor and outdoor. Kim Clijsters Whenever I think of Kim Clijsters I think of Andre Agassi. Kim hasn’t achieved anything near as much as Agassi, but she certainly shares one thing in common which is her love of hard courts. Clijsters has won 41 titles and 29 have come on hard court. So like Agassi, three quarters of Clijsters’ titles have come on hard courts. Putting aside the statistics, what reminds me of Agassi is the way Kim approaches hard court matches. Clijsters seems to have faith in the bounce where she knows there will not be any bad or strange bounces that you would get on c...

As we are presently in the heart of the North American hard court season, it's time to take a look at some of the greatest hard court players of the Open Era. I will take a look at the greatest male champions first, analyzing their achievements, games, and what made them great on the surface. In the next article I will focus on the great women hard court players of the Open Era. There have been some dominant players on the surface in the Open Era, especially since the late 1970s to mid 1980s, when most grass tournaments were pulled up and replaced with low-maintenance hard courts. The rise of hard court tennis coincided with the introduction of graphite rackets and the transition to the modern power game. The Australian Open is the most high-profile example of this. They switched from grass to rubber hard courts called rebound ace in 1987 and then switched to a medium-paced plexicushion hard court in 2007. Ivan Lendl Ivan Lendl is a player that has consistently been pre...

Today we witnessed a start of a new era with Petra Kvitova defeating Maria Sharapova 6-3 6-4 in the Wimbledon final.   It was a sensational performance for a first time finalist.   Maria Sharapova was outplayed in the 1st set and even though Sharapova fought hard in the 2nd set and got a couple of breaks, Kvitova broke back each time and held her composure well.   Kvitova fought off the nerves to serve out the match to love, even serving her first ace on match point. I saw Kvitova for the first time two weeks ago. I travelled to Eastbourne to watch the Aegon International final between Kvitova and Marion Bartoli of France.   That final lasted 2hrs and 30 minutes and was an interesting match just before Wimbledon.   Kvitova lost the match in 3 sets but I was very impressed with her game and attitude. The first set went by like a flash as Kvitova lost the 1st set 6-1 in 29 minutes.   Kvitova was hitting shots all over the place and couldn’t get the...

As you know by now, Jo Wilfried Tsonga made a great comeback in the Wimbledon quarterfinal against Roger Federer.  Tsonga lost the first two sets 6-4 and 7-6 but fought back to win the next three sets 6-4 6-4 6-4.  It was the manner of Tsonga’s comeback which was really impressive.  Federer played a good match and his level didn’t actually drop much, but Tsonga stuck to his principles and style of play and got his reward as a result. Meanwhile Federer probably played too passive which he is prone to do often. The style of play which could be described as attacking tennis, is a rare sight in the mens game today.  We hear the phrase “aggressive Tennis” a lot but certainly not attacking Tennis.  Aggressive tennis can be described as taking the game to your opponent, that usually means big groundstrokes off both wings and a big first serve.    The majority of players have adopted this strategy over the last 10 years.  Examples...

I recently read a very interesting comment on ATP website attributed to Rafael Nadal about the difference in Tennis today and Tennis in the 1990s.  Nadal is quoted as saying “Personally, to watch a Pete Sampras versus Goran Ivanisevic match, or one between those kind of players, is not enjoyable.  It's not really tennis, it is a few swings of the racquet. It was less eye-catching than what we do now. Everyone enjoys the tennis we play much more. I am not saying we are playing better tennis, just more enjoyable tennis. For me, in the past it was just serve, serve, serve." That’s a very interesting comment from a current number 1 player in the world.  It is also a comment either by design or not, which denigrates a whole era of Tennis.  Not only that, but for the younger generation, it would paint the impression that every player from that time period were just good at serving and nothing else. Now for slightly older Tennis fans who have been watching Tennis for m...

With Wimbledon upon us for another year, it would be interesting to take a look at some of the best players who excelled at Wimbledon but never managed to lift the trophy in the last 30 years. Ivan Lendl Ivan Lendl had a very good grass court record. He made it to two finals in 1986 and 1987, plus the semifinals in 1983, 1984, 1988, 1989, and 1990. You won’t get a much better record than that. Plus, there have been players who have won Wimbledon with nowhere near as good an overall record of wins. Lendl lost in straight sets to a brilliant Boris Becker in 1986 and Pat Cash in 1987. Lendl had many attributes to win Wimbledon, including a big serve plus athleticism, but the criticism was that he changed his game for grass by serving and volleying when he should have played his natural game instead. This critique is tough because back then everyone came to the net, and the grass courts weren’t as playable for baseline tennis as they are now. Pat Rafter   Pat Raf...