My Wimbledon highlight came on Saturday evening when rain stopped play. The BBC showed a wonderful film on the rise and rise of Bjorn Borg. He never fell, he simply did a Garbo. Five Wimbledon triumphs in succession, one lost final and then he wanted to be alone. He no longer had the hunger and without the hunger there was nothing.
I watched the whole thing with a lump in my throat – for Borg; for the bleached-out colour of the 1970s; for the tiny rackets and tight shorts; for his headband; for his T-shirts that looked like Pacer mints. For the epic matches with Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe and Vitas Gerulaitis. And, most of all, for my childhood.Later I was reminded that Pete Sampras won two more Wimbledon titles than Borg and won 14 majors in total – four more than Federer, three more than Borg and two more than Roy Emerson; that, theoretically, he is the best there has been.
That lollop-tongued, bish-bash bore the greatest of all time? Give me a break.
I loved Borg – he turned me on to the game. I despised Sampras – he turned me away. I stopped watching when Pistol Pete bullied his opponents into rally-free submission. Man as machine: it was horrible to watch in every sense.The strange thing is that the Ice Borg was also called a machine. His detractors, and some of his admirers, said he had no pulse (it was actually recorded at 35bpm), no fear, no heart. How wrong they were.
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