McEnroe vs Borg

How strange that after all those years of rivalry it was just a week or so ago as of 31 Mar 2005 that Borg put his trophies and racquets up for sale and it was McEnroe who talked him out of selling them. Perhaps it isn’t that strange though, because despite their highly different personalities and styles of play, they really respected each other when it came to playing tennis. Both of them were great tennis players and their rivalry was such that not even McEnroe lost his temper when playing Borg because he knew he needed all his energy to beat him.
McEnroe

John McEnroe was born in in 1959 and was a brilliant junior tennis player like Borg had been, but McEnroe attended Standford for a short time before he went on tour full-time. He won the French Open mixed doubles at age 18 in 1977 and then went into the junior and senior US Open events of that year. He never played in the junior event because he reached the semi-finals of the senior event. That was when John McEnroe started to become hot news.



McEnroe went on to win 3 Wimbledons and 4 US opens. He never won the Australian or the French. He played many Davis Cups and a lot of doubles though. He played 2 of the longest Davis Cup games on record in 1982 and 1987. He won 77 singles titles and 77 doubles titles, but as of 2006 we hear that he will play senior doubles again, having seen Martina Hingis and Martina Navratilova come out of retirement to win a few events, I’m guessing.
Borg

Borg was born in in 1956. He won 62 singles titles. He won 6 French Opens and 5 Wimbledons. He didn’t venture down to much but I did see an exhibition match between Borg and McEnroe in 1981 at Kooyong and strangely enough it was during this match that he confided in both McEnroe and Gerulaitus that he was retiring. Borg retired at the ripe old age of 25, so he had accomplished much in that time.



The biggest match Borg and McEnroe played was the Wimbledon Singles final of 1980. Many commentators say that this was the greatest match ever played. So what makes it so special? I think a match up has to include not only brilliant tennis minds and players with high degrees of skill but also with very different styles. These days slug fests from the back of the court are not very interesting, in my view. Also 2 serve volleyers with great fast and accurate serves can make a match a bit dull. But this was the match up of serve volley (McEnroe) and baseline two-handed backhands (Borg). It was also the cool, very fit and athletic Swede against the hot-headed New Yorker who had the strangest but most effective serve and great eye-hand coordination to make him a great volleyer from the net. Borg was also every girls dream while McEnroe was a bit gauche then.



This match was also between a man attempting to extend 4 consecutive Wimbledon titles to 5 (Borg) and another who was attempting to win his first (McEnroe). In 1979-80 Borg had been number one and McEnroe had taken top spot for about 3 weeks. This match would decide the number one spot. They had played 7 times but never in a grand slam.



Borg won the match but it was very close, taking the spectators to highs and lows as all good sport should do. It went to 5 sets. The first Borg lost 1-6. He then won the second and third and should have won the 4th except for a thrilling tie-breaker which McEnroe won. This tie-breaker was outstanding. McEnroe held 5 set points and Borg held 5 championship points. Borg went on to win the 5th.



During their careers, they met 14 times and each won 7 each. That Wimbledon had been Borg’s finest win but McEnroe did go on being younger and playing for longer, to win many more grand slams. McEnroe always admired Borg. He said he was the finest athlete he had ever seen on a tennis court and Borg always found McEnroe’s left handed serve extremely hard to return.



McEnroe continued in the serve volley mode which made him such a great doubles player, but Borg revolutionized tennis in that the two-hander and the baseline play is now the norm. More’s the pity in my view as the “Australian” style is more to my liking, but ’s top player plays the Borg way. He’s not as good, but the kids of Borg’s time took on his style.



McEnroe is still around the tennis world being active in many of its institutions and in being a commentator. He really lights up the court when he goes on to interview players at the end of a match and I love his knowledge as a commentator. Borg however left the tennis scene at the age of 25 going on to 3 marriages, scandals and many business ventures. McEnroe also had marriage troubles and invited Borg to his second marriage. The difference now is that you get the feeling that McEnroe loved the whole tennis scene and history of the game much more than the self-contained Borg ever did.