The Australian Tennis ace, Rod Laver
The former Australian Tennis player, Rodney George "Rod" Laver was born on 9 August 1938 in the city of Rockhampton. The left handed Rod was named as the number one tennis player by the ATP world rankings on seven occasions in a row from 1964 to 1970. Moreover, he is also the only tennis ace from the men’s side and triumphed in all four of the Grand Slam tournaments in a year on two occasions. First time as a unprofessional player in 1962 and on second occasion as a specialized one back in 1969. Laver, the aggressive ground stroke player is second as well as the last tennis player from the men’s side to triumph in every major championship twice in his professional life. Only Margaret Court and Roy Emerson and had succeeded in all of the four Grand Slam championships twice prior to Laver in the history of the game.
Laver left his school when he was a teenage boy in order to take up the game of tennis seriously. He was first trained by Charlie Hollis in Queensland and later on by Harry Hopman, the skipper of the Davis cup side of Australia who used to call him, “Rocket’.
Laver as a junior flashy player won the 1957 U.S junior tournament as well as the Australian Junior competition back in 1957. A major turning point in Laver’s career came when he made his way into all the three finals of the grass court Grand Slam event back in 1959, triumphing in the mixed doubles trophy along with his pair Darlene Hard. As an unseeded contester, he was knocked down in the singles final by Peruvian Alex Olmedo after playing an 87-game semi final match versus American Barry MacKay. His very first major singles trophy came in 1960 at the Australian tournament where he knocked down compatriot player Neale Fraser in a five set encounter. As a result, Laver grabbed his very first grass court singles title back in 1961.
Laver turned professional in the year 1962. He swiftly developed himself as a top class player and thus became famous along with other top ranked tennis stars including Ken Rosewall as well as Pancho Gonzales.
In the next couple of years, Laver triumphed in the United States Pro tournament on five occasions, including four consecutive wins starting in 1966. The Australian tennis ace was embarrassingly knocked down by Hoad as well as Rosewall in the first half of the year 1963. Rosewall triumphed in the first eleven games out of the total thirteen versus Laver where as Hoad succeeded in the first eight ones against him. However, in spite of all these defeats, Laver managed to gain the number two spot in the world ATP player’s professional ranking towards the end of the season, with Rosewall ahead at the number one spot.
Laver as well as Rosewall in 1964 captured a total of seven significant trophies including the four minor ones as well. However, the Australian player succeeded in fifteen of the total nineteen matches contested against Rosewall and won the two most esteemed trophies, the U.S. Pro tournament by falling down Gonzales as well as the Wembley Pro tournament by knocking down Rosewall.
The next year, Rod Laver was without any question the number one professional tennis player grabbing a total of seventeen trophies. The 1.70 meters tall Laver continued his winning momentum even in the next year and finished off the season 1966 with six titles to his name.
The following year, Laver even performed better and won a total of nineteen trophies including the grass court Grand Slam pro, the Wembley Pro tournament, the United States Pro competition as well as the French Open contest.
During the open era, starting from 1968, Rod Laver won the first open era grass court Grand Slam tournament in the same year, after knocking down Tony Roche in straight sets. He also finished off the French Open championship in the same year as the runner up. Towards the end of the year, the Australian tennis ace also succeeded in the Pacific Southwest held in Los Angeles on hard surfaces. The next year, Laver triumphed in all the four Grand Slam events of the season. He triumphed in eighteen of the thirty two singles championships he participated and registered a 106-16 win loss record.
The Australian tennis sensation is also known for his record match successes in a row at the grass court Grand Slam tournament from 1961 to 1970, which prevailed until 1980 when it was ended by Bjorn Borg.
The player with a disguised left handed serve dominated the world of tennis for a number of years and went on to win many important tournaments such as U.S. Professional Championships, South African Open title, the United States Professional tournament, Philadelphia U.S. Pro Indoor, Wembley British Indoor championship, Tennis Champions Classic, Sydney Dunlop Open apart from all the four Grand Slam titles to his name.
Rod grabbed a record forty five open trophies after he turned thirty. And in spite of the fact that he was growing older, his win-loss record all through the open era was almost 80% as far as the singles are concerned which sets him at the number sixth position among the list of open era behind Jimmy Connors, Roger Federer, Bjorn Borg, John McEroe as well as Ivan Lendl however ahead of the pistol Pete.
This legendary tennis star announced his retirement after gifting some exemplary moments of tennis for ages back in 1979 as a result of health issues. However, there is no doubt about the fact that Rod Laver was truly a gem of a player.
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