Before we get into this impossible debate, I'm setting some parameters. We don't discuss off-court achievements, crowd favoritism, or how elegantly our players could have behaved, coming solely from the Open era.
Instead, I imagine Admire– a style of struggle for the existence of our planet, based on a single tennis match with an unknown challenger from a parallel universe. And the choice of surface will be decided by the roll of the dice. Deep breath, please.
10. Monika Seles
She would probably have taken first place if not for the tragedy that occurred in Hamburg in 1993, when her career was interrupted by Steffi Graf's obsession with knife-wielding. At this point, Seles' relentless two-handed hitting on both wings had seen her win 55 of her last 56 major tournament matches – an astonishing statistic – with her only loss being a hard defeat to Graf in the 1992 Wimbledon final.
One of Seles' greatest strengths was her simplicity, where you could see the ball and hit the ball: there just weren't many things that could go wrong, and she never overcomplicated what she thought was a simple game. However, she has never won Wimbledon, which is one of the reasons why she ranks relatively low on this list.
9. Bjorn Borg
Tricky business. Borg had a relatively short career, but his track record is so good that I'm giving him a chance in my squad. He never won the US Open, which in his day was played on grass, and only went to Australia once, but he still maintains a 90% win rate in majors, something only Graf can match on our list.
In her case, this is facilitated by the lack of great rivals; in his decision to retire from the sport at the peak of his physical fitness, at the age of 26. Despite the glamor of Borg-mania, he played with a very conservative style, based on eliminating mistakes and superhuman endurance. He was famous for his resting heart rate of only 35 beats per minute.
8. Rafael Nadal
I'm sure I'll get slaughtered for this, but the fact is that we're rolling the dice when it comes to choosing the surface and the chance of playing a match on clay is only one in three. It's clear that Nadal's clay-court record is a world apart from anything we've seen in tennis history.
At Wimbledon, however, his winning percentage of 83 is good but not great, showing the relative vulnerability of his serve. That number rose to 84 in the two hard court tournaments, but at Roland Garros it reached a staggering 97.
7. Clutter Maker
“Rocket” only appears briefly in our calculations because he played most of his career before the Open era, but winning a calendar Grand Slam in 1969 (as he did in 1962, before he turned pro) was a rare and historic achievement. a feat that has yet to be replicated in the men's game.
As tough as crocodile skin, this Queensland boy was only 5ft 1in tall, but was famous for the size of his Popeye-like left forearm and the quality of his volleys. The only serious contender that prefigures the Borg revolution of the 1970s.
6.Chris Evert
Evert, the ice maiden of tennis, an astonishing 80-match rivalry with Martina Navratilova puts even the “Big Three” in the shadow. Even more remarkably, 60 of these meetings ended in finals, with Navratilova losing by a score of 43 to 37. As with Roger Federer's rivalry with Nadal, it was a brilliant contrast of styles and personalities, with Evert's ruthless fundamental accuracy offering a sort of Defense of Sicily against aggression attacking the opponent's network.
Besides, has anyone ever kept a cool head on the court? Evert joins Nadal in that rare category of players who have never wavered.
5. Roger Federer
Federer's all-court mastery is obscured by the fact that he was trying to win the French Open at the same time as Rafael Nadal. In fact, he is the only man to have won 10 titles on each of the three surfaces – even if that statistic also reflects Djokovic's reluctance to play grass-court warm-up games before Wimbledon.
An incredible favorite, his winning percentage from winning his first Grand Slam title (Wimbledon 2003) to the end of 2007 was 92 percent, with 12 major tournaments eliminated from a possible 20. Nadal and Djokovic then limited Federer to just eight more major titles, but his re-emergence in 2017 with a turbocharged backhand that eclipsed his former rivals must go down in history as one of the most romantic comebacks in sports.
4. Martina Navratilova
It took some time for Navratilova's career – and her escape from Czechoslovakia to the US – to blossom. But she really blossomed in her early 20s, after switching to a graphite racket and taking fitness seriously. An explosive athlete whose pace and power combined with excellent volleying technique made her almost unbeatable at Wimbledon, where she won six straight singles titles between 1982 and 1987.
During this purple run, Navratilova won 14 of 21 majors and was runner-up four times, while posting a staggering 95 tournament winning percentage.
3. Steffi Graf
Another bulletproof mental monster, “Fraulein Forehand,” won a gold slam (in all four majors and an Olympic gold medal in singles) and at least four titles in each of those tournaments, despite cutting the vast majority of her backhands. Her winning percentage is extremely high – as high as 89.75 in majors, for example – and she has suffered several horrific defeats in majors, including the infamous double bagel over Natalia Zvereva at the 1988 French Open. On the other hand, Graf rarely faced a truly strong opponent, with Arantxa Sánchez Vicario being her closest rival for most of her career.
2. Novak Djokovic
He has proven beyond any doubt that he is the greatest man in the history of tennis with an unrivaled level of balance between three different surfaces. Indeed, balance is key to Djokovic's game. His ability to glide on any surface likely stems from his childhood spent on the ski slopes of Kapaonik, a Serbian mountain lodge, and his incredible flexibility allowed him to recover from seemingly impossible situations countless times throughout his career.
Not the most elegant or charming player to watch, but a finely calibrated winning machine and, mentally, the hardest nut to crack.
1. Serena Williams
Simply the most irresistible force I've ever seen on the tennis court, with the most locker room power of all time. She won 23 majors despite losing interest for a significant period in the mid-1990s, and then became a mother at age 36 while she was still a dominant force. There is a strong argument that 23 majors is a poor result for a woman whose entire package – technique, physicality and mentality – was as superior on the court as Simone Biles was to any other gymnast.
And look at what Serena was like when she was Really she wanted to win – in other words, when she played with Maria Sharapova. Between 2005 and 2019, she won 19 matches in a row, losing a paltry three sets in the process. I want To Serena will play for the future of Earth.
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