There's nothing like Paris in the springtime, they say. As these 10 epics—the 10 most memorable French Open matches of the Open Era—show, there's also nothing quite as stirring or sensation as tennis in Paris at this time of year.
It’s rare to hear a top tennis player admit that, during a match as important as a French Open final, she was able to stop and take a second to savor the moment. It’s even more surprising when that top player is Steffi Graf. But that’s how good the 1996 women’s final was.
“It was such a big joy,” Graf said after her three-hour, three-minute win over Sanchez Vicario, “that sometimes when I was standing out there at 7-6 or 8-7, I almost didn’t know what to do, because I wanted to laugh, it felt so special.”
“And I usually don’t laugh,” Graf added, in case anyone believed that Fraulein Forehand was the frivolous type.
In her teens, when she was winning a calendar-year Grand Slam and running roughshod over the rest of the WTA, Graf was known for stone-cold domination. But by the mid-’90s, as her forehand began to go awry a little more often, and biggest rivals found ways to neutralize it, Graf became better known for her survival skills. Every Grand Slam seemed to end with her locked in another classic three-setter, and those classics usually ended with her willing herself to another win.
Graf engaged in marathon nail-biters with Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, Monica Seles, Jana Novotna, and Mary Joe Fernandez, among others; by the mid-90s, though, it was Sanchez Vicario who had become her most common foil. The German gunner and the Spanish scrambler were made for each other, especially on clay.
WATCH—The ending of Graf's win over Sanchez Vicario in the 1996 French Open final: