Sania Mirza! Is she the Paradigm Shift in Gen-X Indian girl?

geno, have u read of Richards 139* for Glamorgan v Hampshire in 1991? The Sportstar issue dated Oct 16 1993 was a Richards special after his retirement - a super duper issue :D

Lot of memories of Lendl...US Open finalist regularly from 82-89. Ilaiyaraja's hottest run coincided with Lendl's peak :D

Junior Wimbledon is just a tournament thats all..no big deal. Even Paes won it in 1990 and hardly entered the top 100 in his career. While a 5 match Davis Cupper like Zeeshan Ali reached upto 110 a few years. So basically no difference between a Kid Wimby winner like Paes and a mediocre guy like Zeeshan :lol2: :lol2:

If you look at this list, you will find lot of mediocre winners:
http://www.wimbledon.org/en_GB/history/boysroll.html

I became Lendl fan in 1984 after the French Open in the no-TV era. The Hindu in June 84 featured a triumphant Lendl with French Open after beating McEnroe(2 sets down) from a blood and thunder final. Lost to Connors (in semis I think) in 84 Wimby. Lost to Mac in 84 US Open final.

I was looking forward to his 2nd Grand Slam in FO 85 but lost to Wilander in 4 sets(Mats won FO in 82 as a 17 y/o debutant and runner up in 83 to Noah). In 85 Wimby, Lendl was knocked out (in 4th round I think) by Henri Leconte. I was very happy that Mac was knocked out by Kevin Curren in QF the next day :D

Mac married Tatum O Neal (Enna jodi porutham?!? - Hollywood star Tatum O Neal used to fly at her dad's 2nd, 3rd wives as a kid...Hollywood called this pair Mac the Mouth and Tantrum O Neal :lol2: :lol2: ) in July-Aug 85 and Mac was whipped by Lendl in US Open final taking over the No.1 Ranking.

86 was Lendl's peak - No Aus Open that year. Lendl won FO in 86 beating Edberg in semis and Chesnokov in the final, lost Wimby final and won US Open.

Wimby 86: Pat Cash came 2 weeks out of an appendisectomy and stormed into the QF. Lost to Leconte in a thriller. Ramesh lost to Slobodan Zivojinovic in another QF.

I was very happy to see Becker knock out Leconte(Lendl-killer of 85) in the semis. But only to see Becker beat Lendl in the final. Till then I had considered Becker a fluke.(DD did not telecast 86 final live as that day July 6, ex-PM jagjivan Ram had passed away).

I knew Lendl was gonna lose once Cash entered the final. That day, July 5 1987 - Cash served first and won the game in 2 min. Lendl's turn to serve and the game went for several deuces, taking 14 min. Appove theriyum, Lendl-ku sangu-nu. Atleast Imran reached his 300th wicket the same day - some consolation :)

1989, I was dead sure Lendl was gonna win. He was in peak touch all through. Leading Becker 2 sets to 1 and up by a break in the fourth set. 3 more games and his biggest obstacle would be over.
Unfortunately there was a bad line-call and Lendl argued with the umpire for a while. Becker held serve and started sending thunderbolts with his backhand returns. I have never seen such scorching backhands till Justine Henin came up in 2001 :(

It was a nail-biting 2-2 in the final set on that fatal semis July 7 1989. I was hoping Lendl will finally use his last reserves of strength to pull through. DD broke for the 930 English news.

The news ended at 9:50 and we went back to Center Court, the suspense to hear the latest score was painful and intense. The scene was an interval after the break and there was pin drop silence for a minute. Even the commentators were not telling the score. "TIME" called up the umpire, the players walked back to court. The camera panned the Rolex scoreboard - it was 5-2 in favor of Becker, thats it!!!! :cry: :cry:

Lendl held to 5-3 and in the next game, Boris served out Lendl's Wimby career for good :(

Will write later over the Tamil Nadu-Australia Davis Cup triumph of 87 :D