“Grass is only for cows,” said Thomas Muster in view of his rather modest performance on grass. The Styrian was only able to win eight out of 18 games on this surface in his career.
On the “sacred turf” of Wimbledon, he remained without a win – the only world number one in history!
Anyone who regularly followed the events in the tennis circus at that time knew that after the often brilliant clay court season, red-white-red successes would be limited in the grass court season.
Austria was and is a clay court nation, which is why most domestic players have always had problems on the unfamiliar surface.
In addition to small successes by Alex Antonitsch, it was not until 1999 that Jürgen Melzer managed to make a stronger impression: the Lower Austrian won the junior competition and later also triumphed in doubles (2010 with Philipp Petzschner) and mixed (2011 with Iveta Benesova).
Extremely short rallies in the 90s
During this period, however, a fundamental change also took place in tennis: after the dominance of the serve and volley specialists in the 90s, those in charge tried to make the game on grass more similar to that on other surfaces.
Many had had enough of rallies lasting only a few seconds, which resulted from the flat ball bounce on grass and the ever-increasing speed. The majority of the points were already decided after the serve, most of the sets played were decided by a single break, and often a tiebreak had to be the deciding factor.
Strong servers like Goran Ivanisevic, Richard Krajicek, Pete Sampras and Patrick Rafter dominated the action at Wimbledon. The 1994 final between Sampras and Ivanisevic hardly featured any rallies of more than three strokes. Baseline specialists like Muster or the numerous Spaniards and South Americans were left out on grass.
Millennium brought new era
At the turn of the millennium, a new era in grass tennis began. The balls became softer, the courts became slower (the direction of the cut was changed, for example). The serve is still more important on grass than on other surfaces, but the “baseliners” now also have a chance of winning major titles.
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Rafael Nadal proved this in 2008 at the latest, when the four-time French Open winner and proven clay court specialist from Mallorca suddenly triumphed at Wimbledon with his final victory over grass court king Roger Federer. Dominic Thiem also secured a grass court title early in his career in Stuttgart in 2016 – something that would probably have been unattainable in the 90s with his style of play with extreme topspin.
There are still differences between clay and hard courts – the ball bounce is much flatter, for example – but at first glance the differences in gameplay are only marginal. Sometimes, when watching TV broadcasts, it looks like a computer game from the 90s where only the background color has changed, but the game mechanics remain the same.
Criticism of the lack of surface differences
A fact that has also been criticized in some cases. It was precisely the differences between the various surfaces that created a special flair in the last century. The different playing styles of the players brought more variety to the game. It was even more impressive when an all-rounder like Andre Agassi could compete at the world class level on all surfaces.
On the other hand, there is no doubt that the current baseline duels are not causing excitement for nothing and have contributed significantly to the tennis boom of recent years. The “boom-boom tennis” of the 90s may have provided some excitement in the end, but in the long run it also brought with it a certain monotony.
It is clear that grass tennis should definitely have a future. If only because modern tennis originated on this surface at the end of the 19th century. An important step was taken some time ago by extending the grass season by a week, which now allows three weeks of preparation time for Wimbledon.
What is still missing is an ATP 1000 tournament on grass. However, due to the time-consuming maintenance of a grass court, this will be difficult to implement. But somehow it would still be nice.
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2024-06-27 16:48:40
#cows #lawn #tennis #future
