To fill that off-season void for you junkies, I’m reviewing a You Tube tennis clip each day for the next two weeks. We’re starting—where else?—with a trip through the career of Bjorn Borg.
Today we rejoin Borg three years after we last saw him, with two videos from 1976. The first is a highlight reel taken from a German broadcast of his win over Roscoe Tanner in the Wimbledon semis; the second is a too-brief interlude from his loss to Jimmy Connors in the final at Forest Hills later that summer, one of the classic matches of the Open era.
Beware the You Tube highlight montage. It might lead you to believe that a player’s career consisted of nothing but glorious, improbable winners. And that’s true here with Borg: If this clip is an accurate indication, he was in absolute top form on this day. Maybe he was. ’Scoe and his sonic serve typically gave Borg trouble, but not this time; the Swede beat him 6-4, 9-8, 6-4. Here’s what stuck out to me while watching this elegant drubbing.
—Borg is noticeably fiercer as a 20-year-old than he was at 17. It was Bud Collins, I believe, who dubbed him the Angelic Assassin, and you can see why here. The soft boyishness is long gone, replaced by a champion’s purposeful strut. He had won the French Open in 1974 and ’75 and was now stalking his first Wimbledon title. In fact, with the beard, long hair, and serene self-possession, it’s hard to believe he’s just 20, the age of a college junior.
—I love the dissolves. It's like a silent movie.
—The legend is that Borg spent the short period between the French and Wimbledon in 1976 working on his serve, and in that brief time made it into a career-changing weapon. From what I remember, his coach, Lennart Bergelin, suggested that he change his stance slightly, and five straight Wimbledon titles followed—could it really have been that easy? He is serving brilliantly against Tanner, moving him off the court on the deuce side, setting himself up for volleys close to the net—the way he moves forward, Borg looks like a natural serve-and-volleyer—and even belting a howitzer-like ace down the middle.
—The first point is an eye-opener: Borg digs out a forehand volley as if he’s John Newcombe, then ranges back to crack a confident overhead into the corner. I seem to remember Borg’s overhead not being this good later in his career. Just speculating, but maybe his early retirement, at 26, shouldn’t have been that surprising. He seems to be at the peak of his powers at age 20. Incredible that he would rise even farther in 1978, when he began his run of three straight French-Wimbledon doubles. I wonder if, percentage-wise, Borg played the most winning points of any great champion. He packed a lot of victories into his nine years on tour.
—Borg may look like a natural serve-and-volleyer, but not quite a natural volleyer. He has a little, unneeded, upward flourish at the end of his punch.
—Tanner’s serve, like Goran’s later, was entertaining to watch in itself. The low toss must have made it virtually unreadable.
—Do they still use chalk at Wimbledon? Or a different type? You can see it fly—“chalk flew up!"—on a Tanner ace here. I don’t think it does that anymore.
—Borg’s racquet is a Donnay Pro, I believe. It's about halfway to the famous signature black-and-orange model he used later, and which I used as kid. Loved the all-black individual racquet covers that came with them. But this Donnay from ’76 looks just as cool.
—Like the southern-boy Tanner hair? He looks like he could have been the quarterback for Bear Bryant's Crimson Tide.
—Tanner had some touch, as you can see on a dink volley and a lob that he almost gets over Borg’s head. The Swede shows off real improvisatory athleticism to reach back and direct it crosscourt for a winner.
—Borg had to have the best passing shots in history. By the last games, he’s in full flight, putting the ball past Tanner every way possible. Check out the way he anticipates a Tanner second serve wide in the ad court, runs all the way around it to get a forehand, and rolls it nicely up the line for a winner. Remind you of anyone?
—Despite the poor quality of this clip, this is one I’ll go back to when I want to remember just how good Borg was at all parts of the sport, and at remaking his own game for grass.
Now we jump ahead a few months, to a very different atmosphere. This is the U.S. Open final, between native son Jimmy Connors and a less-sure-of-himself Borg. The old horseshoe stadium at Forest Hills has a more chaotic atmosphere; when the camera pans upward, it looks a mob has gathered to watch a killing in the coliseum. A mob of ladies in nice hats.
Thoughts:
—I wish it were longer. Is this match available anywhere else? It’s one of the first that I remember watching. The whole thing hinged on the third-set tiebreaker, which Connors won 11-9. I recall a very charged scene, where a ball boy informed the chair umpire that the players had to change sides a second time. Am I remembering that correctly?
—Borg is playing more passively. I can only assume he’s trying to use the sofball game that had become the accepted strategy against Connors, and which Ashe and Orantes had used the year before to beat him in two major finals. It doesn’t work this day, as you can see that Connors is on his game and hitting big. When you see a player jump back and put away an overhead the way Connors does here, you know he’s sharp.
—Love the Borg pass again. First the snap of the forehand that goes back to Connors, then a crosscourt backhand, then finally a beautiful backhand down the line winner. Show that to a young player if you want them to learn how to get down for a ball. Borg bends low but stays completely balanced.
—Like the little sliver of orange sun you can see at the top of the stands. Night is creeping in. Borg didn't like to play at night. Connors, of course, owned the New York night.
—Notice that neither guy could hit outright winners on returns or from deep in the court. They pretty much had to end points at the net, even on clay.
—Connors indeed hit a heavy ball; you can see where it would have been a shock at the time.
—My favorite moment is seeing Borg scramble to his backhand side, flip back a low backhand pass, slide all the way to the other side to send up a forehand lob, and still lose the point on the aforementioned Connors overhead. Looking back, you might wonder how Borg could have lost the Open to Connors on clay. But sometimes the other guy is just too good.
Tomorrow we look at Borg in his lair, grinding a helpless opponent into the dust at Roland Garros.