Saturday, November 9, 2024

10 grass-court tournaments you may never have known existed

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5. Australian tournaments

When the Australian Open was staged on grass, so too were the other Australian summer circuit events.

In January 1987, the men warmed up for the Australian Open on grass in Adelaide, while the women did so in Brisbane and Sydney’s White City. Immediately following the AO, the men headed to Sydney for their week of the NSW Open at White City.

As tennis writer and historian Suzi Petkovski notes: “All the Australian state championships were played on grass until around the time of the Australian Open’s move to Flinders/Melbourne Park.

“The NSW Open, first played in 1883, is even older than the Australian Championships and is one of the oldest continuously run tournaments in the world.”

6. Auckland

This long-running tournament has been staged in Auckland since 1956, with both men’s and women’s singles events.

It was a grass-court tournament every year until switching to hard courts in 1978.

7. Wimbledon lead-ups

“Like in Australia, most counties and regions of Britain had their local events, predominantly on grass,” Petkovski recalled.

“A big one was the North of England Championships, established in 1884 and abolished in 1974. It was played at several venues over the span, mostly in Scarborough when it was a seaside summer resort. It has many Wimbledon winners on its honour roll.”

Indeed, in the early days of the Open era this tournament was won by John Newcombe, Margaret Court, Virginia Wade, Evonne Goolagong, Billie Jean King – all players who triumphed at the All England Club.

There were also several other popular Wimbledon lead-in events, all contested on grass, which no longer exist today as tour-level stops.

These include the Kent Championships at Beckenham, the Bristol and Manchester Opens, and the Chichester women’s tournament in the 1970s.

8. Irish Championships

Later known as the Irish Open, this historic event was first staged in 1879 – just two years after the first edition of Wimbledon – and was once considered among the sport’s most prestigious titles.

As a grass-court event it formed part of the men’s and women’s professional tours in the early 1970s and former winners include King, Court, Goolagong, Wade, Tony Roche, Cliff Drysdale, and Tom Okker.

“John McEnroe, because of his Irish heritage, always wanted to play here but the tournament no longer existed on the official tour,” Petkovski explained.

“He played a couple of exhibitions there ahead of Wimbledon in the early 1980s.”

9. Antalya

Until recently, another grass-court event leading into Wimbledon could be found, of all places, in Asia.

Antalya, a resort city on Turkey’s southern Mediterranean coast, hosted the 250-level tournament on grass from 2017 to 2019, when the seven courts were curated under the guidance of the All England Club.

The tournament switched to hard courts in 2021 – its last year as a stop on the ATP Tour.

10. Queen’s and Newport, for women

Today’s ATP grass-court events at Queen’s and Newport also used to have women’s singles competitions.

And from 2025, a WTA event will return to Queen’s Club for the first time since 1973, the week prior to the ATP event.

“On the walls of the Queen’s Club where you’ve got your pictures of Laver and co., you’ve also got Margaret Court and Billie Jean King and Chris Evert,” said former Queen’s tournament director Stephen Farrow, on The Sit-Down podcast.

LISTEN: Stephen Farrow on The Sit-Down

“I remember a few years ago seeing a documentary about the Battle of the Sexes and they interviewed Billie Jean King, and she’s standing at Queen’s.”

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