Sunday, September 09, 2007
I've always loved the elegant simplicity of tennis: Hit a ball back and forth over a net, the first one that misses loses the point. Of course, the scoring is a bit different from every other game I can think of, but I think that it importantly provides a rhythm that would be otherwise be missed completely.
I played and watched a lot of tennis in the early 80's and I can see how the game has changed. And although I really enjoy watching players like Federer and Henin, one thing that has made the game less interesting to watch is how similar the players' games are now. Twenty five years ago, the various top players had styles that were quite different from one another. For example, Borg played big looping strokes with heavy topspin from the baseline seldom coming to net, Connors used very flat spinless shots with constant agression, McEnroe was superb serve and volley with strokes that looked nothing like anyone else's, Vilas was heavy topspin, onhanded on both sides, Evert was steady baseline play, while Navratilova was super agressive serve and volley, Jaeger was slower baseline play with moon balls, Mandlikova was an all-court game, and on and on. Today, seems to be less difference in style of play, the main difference being that of execution, and sometimes, from a distance it's hard to tell exactly who's playing.
Another interesting point is that serve and volley tennis is almost gone. This link will search YouTube for "borg wimbledon". This link will search YouTube for "federer wimbledon". Both searches will return results from Wimbledon finals of the era. Have a look at the wear pattern on the court in Borg's time versus Federer's time. Nowadays, there's almost no wear near the service line because almost no one is playing serve and volley, even at Wimbledon.
Interesting how the game has changed.
I played and watched a lot of tennis in the early 80's and I can see how the game has changed. And although I really enjoy watching players like Federer and Henin, one thing that has made the game less interesting to watch is how similar the players' games are now. Twenty five years ago, the various top players had styles that were quite different from one another. For example, Borg played big looping strokes with heavy topspin from the baseline seldom coming to net, Connors used very flat spinless shots with constant agression, McEnroe was superb serve and volley with strokes that looked nothing like anyone else's, Vilas was heavy topspin, onhanded on both sides, Evert was steady baseline play, while Navratilova was super agressive serve and volley, Jaeger was slower baseline play with moon balls, Mandlikova was an all-court game, and on and on. Today, seems to be less difference in style of play, the main difference being that of execution, and sometimes, from a distance it's hard to tell exactly who's playing.
Another interesting point is that serve and volley tennis is almost gone. This link will search YouTube for "borg wimbledon". This link will search YouTube for "federer wimbledon". Both searches will return results from Wimbledon finals of the era. Have a look at the wear pattern on the court in Borg's time versus Federer's time. Nowadays, there's almost no wear near the service line because almost no one is playing serve and volley, even at Wimbledon.
Interesting how the game has changed.
# posted by goldpython @ 8:27 AM 
