Rafael Nadal may well be on his way to becoming the greatest player ever on the claycourts of Roland Garros but he will likely never be held in more affection than the soon-to-be retired Gustavo Kuerten.
The already popular Brazilian forever won the hearts of an adoring Paris public for a spontaneous gesture at the end of an extraordinary fourth round tie against American Michael Russell in 2001.
Two sets and match point down and apparently about to ingloriously lose the title he had won for the second time the previous year, Kuerten dug deep, clawed his way back into the match and, with the center crowd noisily behind him, eventually triumphed.
PHOTO: AP
At the end he sunk to his knees and traced a huge heart with his racket on the dusty, red clay to dedicate his win to the fans in the stands.
A week later, “Guga,” as he came to be known, repeated the touching gesture after the final in which he beat Alex Corretja in four sets and again the crowd went wild.
Recalling his emotions after the win over Russell, Kuerten said: “I experienced something incredible that day.”
“I could feel the fans behind me and there was a synergy between us. It was a magic moment — I’ve never felt anything quite like that,” he said.
Kuerten had exploded onto the Paris tennis scene four years earlier when as an unknown 20-year-old, ranked 66th in the world, he became the first Brazilian male to win a Grand Slam title.
In so doing he defeated along the way three former champions — Thomas Muster, Yevgeny Kafelnikov and in the final Sergi Bruguera.
More than the victory itself though it was the flamboyant manner in which he played and his obvious warm connection with the fans that caught the eye.
Dressed in Brazilian football colors and with a samba-band pounding out support, Kuerten, who wore his heart on his sleeve on the court, was a refreshing change from the dour grinders of the game like previous winners Bruguera, Kafelnikov and Muster who had dominated during the 1990s.
He broke into the world 10, but with a big wind-up on either flank usually found it tougher to compete with the best on the faster surfaces. Wimbledon in particular was a problem despite a quarter-final appearance in 1999.
The following year, however, was probably the best of Kuerten’s career.
He won his second French Open title in a tough four-setter against Magnus Norman and then went on to finish the year as world No.1.
When Paddy Dwyer arrived in China in 1976, crowds jostled to catch a glimpse of him and his companions — the first Western soccer team to play in the country. China was emerging from the chaos of the Cultural Revolution, and on the brink of market reforms that would take the country from economic stagnation to explosive growth. “All we could see was lines of people running beside our bus, trying to look in the windows, to see their first visual of a white person,” he said. “It was all bicycles,” he said. “There were very few cars to be seen.” Dwyer,
Jannik Sinner continued his quest to become the first man in history to win five Masters 1000 tournaments in a row with a 6-2, 6-3 victory over Danish qualifier Elmer Moller at the Madrid Open on Sunday. The world leader extended his winning streak to 19 matches, a run that began early March in Indian Wells, and he has captured 24 consecutive victories at the Masters 1000 level, dating back to the Paris Masters last October. Searching for a maiden title at this level on clay, Sinner advanced to the round of 16 at the Caja Magica with a 77-minute performance against
Some of Clearlake Capital Group’s largest investors are growing increasingly concerned about how much time the company’s co-founders are spending on sports investments as they have struggled to complete the fundraising for the private equity firm’s latest flagship fund. One of Clearlake’s co-founders, Behdad Eghbali, has been spending what some investors described as a disproportionate amount of time on the firm’s investment in Chelsea Football Club in recent months. Now, co-founder Jose E. Feliciano and his wife, Kwanza Jones, are nearing a record US$3.9 billion deal to acquire the San Diego Padres. That personal investment by Feliciano has set off the latest
A new NZ$683 million (US$404 million) stadium that was a symbol of Christchurch’s struggle to rebuild after a deadly earthquake struck the New Zealand city is to host its first match tomorrow in front of a sellout crowd. A magnitude 6.2 earthquake killed 185 people in February 2011 and toppled or damaged buildings, including the city’s old Lancaster Park. The stadium, which hosted international rugby and cricket, and was home to the Canterbury Crusaders, was badly damaged and never reopened. It was bulldozed in 2019 and turned into sports fields, leaving the Crusaders without a permanent home. Government funding for a new stadium was
RSS