Sports Then and Now

Kukas Rosol upset Rafael Nadal in the 2nd Round of Wimbledon

As a society, we love upsets—when the decided underdog comes up big to knock off the reportedly sure winner. It levels the playing field for that brief moment and we all feel empowered.

So, when Lukas Rosol sent Rafael Nadal home during their second round match at the All-England Club on Thursday, it marked a true upset. One of the most startling exits at Wimbledon in recent years.

As Rosol remarked in his post-match interview, Nadal is only human.

As such, even the great Nadal has some moments when he does not play his best for whatever reason pundits can determine.

For his part, Nadal had not looked comfortable at all during his early round matches at Wimbledon in 2012; but no one suspected that the world No. 2 could be defeated at this point of the Wimbledon fortnight.

As we look back surveying previous Wimbledon tournaments, determining upsets is a matter of degrees. Whenever the unexpected happens, we call that an upset.

We will use that criteria for discussing some of the greatest Wimbledon upsets in the history of the Modern Era in tennis.

The matches discussed here are listed in chronological order.

The debate about which upset is the most shocking will be saved for a later day.

Certainly this upset of Nadal on Centre Court in 2012 ranks right up there as one of the most shocking.

Read the rest of this entry →

Two women who dominated on tour: Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert.

Points given in a WTA sponsored tennis tournament are used to calculate a players ranking and who ultimately is the No. 1 player on the women’s tour.

Points gained are totaled for one year. Then as the event rolls around again on the calendar, the points earned last year fall off and new points won replace them.

Various tournaments have different point values with the slams offering the most points. For example, the winner of a major receives 2000 ranking points.

The further a player advances in the tournament, the more points she will earn.

Ultimately for the women on tour, only the player’s best 17 tournaments count toward total ranking points. That means a player cannot simply add to her ranking total by entering every tournament.

Historically, for the women’s tour, ranking did not even appear as a statistic until 1921.

Back then rankings were subjective, based on human observation, often a professional panel. Certainly there was no universal system. Calculation of rankings were not point-based until 1975.

Despite the inadequacies of past record-keeping, evidence exists that indicate a number of very talented female players held the No. 1 ranking and dominated the women’s game prior to 1975.

We will use prior subjective rankings and convert those records to an appropriate number of weeks in order to rank the dominance of the top 16 female tennis players since 1921.

Read the rest of this entry →



Serena Williams was the last Australian Open champ in 2010.

Most of the ladies crowned as champions of the Australian Open hailed primarily from Australia back in the early days of this prestigious tennis tournament.

Distance from European capitals and the United States kept the Australian Open a happening mainly for locals, although there were foreign winners from time to time.

Overall Australians have won 43 Australian Open titles, 33 during the Amateur Era and 10 during the Open Era. Their first championship came in 1922 and their last in 1978.

The Aussies are all hoping Samantha Stosur can add to their total by winning the championship in 2011. The time is now for a  native to win the trophy––it has been 33 years, after all.

With defending champion Serena Williams not playing in 2011 because of injury, this year is wide open for the ladies as they look to crown a new champion.

Female champions from the United States are second having won 22 Australian Open titles, 7 in the Amateur Era and 15 during the Open Era.

Half of the ladies in this Top Ten list are logically from Australia and many of them represent titles won during the Amateur Era which began back in 1922.

But all have outstanding results in the “Happy” Slam now held annually in Melbourne.

10. Australian Joan Hartigan Bathurst: Won in 1933, 1934, 1936 – 3 Finals, 3 Wins, 2 Consecutively.

Joan Hartigan Bathurst won three Australian Open titles in her career.

Australian Joan Hartigan-Bathurst played her first Australian Open Championship in 1931 and her last one in 1947. She won three championships during her long career.

Traveling outside of Australia, Hartigan-Bathurst also made the semifinals at Wimbledon twice. She never, however, traveled to play in the United States championships.

During her years playing on tennis courts around the world, Hartigan-Bathurst won three Australian Open titles, made the semifinals twice and the quarterfinals four times.

In 1933 Hartigan-Bathurst defeated Coral Buttsworth to win her first Australian Open title 6-4, 6-3.

The Aussie repeated as champion the following year defeating Margaret Molesworth 6-1, 6-4 in 1934.

Her next Australian Open Championship came in 1936 when Hartigan-Bathurst won over fellow Aussie Nancy Wynn Bolton 6-4, 6-4.

Overall she played in 10 Australian Open Championships, winning three times. Her win loss record was 48-7 giving Hartigan Bathurst a winning percentage of 87.27.

Read the rest of this entry →

Jennifer Capriati defeated Martina Hingis in a memorable 2002 Australian Open final.

Jennifer Capriati and Martina Hingis competed against each other in one of the finest women’s matches in the past decade at the 2002 Australian Open.

Ironically, both started playing competitive tennis at an extremely young age and enjoyed immediate success and acclaim. But both endured controversy and ended their careers prematurely.

Capriati was pushed along early by her father, playing her first professional match in 1990 a couple of weeks before she turned 14. The teenager astounded the tennis world by upending some top-ranked players as she skyrocketed to the No. 8 ranking by the end of the year. She even made the cover of Sports Illustrated.

Capriati was young, bubbling over with enthusiasm. The public and the press adored her.

In 1991 she reached the semifinals at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open. In 1992 she won a gold medal at the Olympics. The more success she enjoyed, however, the more pressure people exerted upon her to do more—win more. Read the rest of this entry →