Alan Trengove on Rod Laver. New Article
 

In a new series of articles on Tennis Australia online Rod Laver and Roger Federer are compared in their careers. To me those articles seem to be quite careful researched and well rounded. The famous Australian tennis writer Alan Trengove, the nestor of Australian tennis experts, gives his recent opinion here:
http://www.tennis.com.au/news/2012/0...er-of-his-time

poorly written and researched IMO .....first off the fact that he speaks so highly of the 62 slam, even though it was only against amateurs and Rod was probably only the 3rd best player in the world at that time ( behind rosewall and hoad ) .....then ....

But how can you be proclaimed the best player that’s ever lived when you’ve lost a series of matches to another player – in this case, Nadal?

err, what ? so the best player ever has to have a winning record vs everyone ? really ?

Not so, Federer, who often looked decidedly uncomfortable at Roland Garros until he won the French title in 2009. It has been his only triumph there in 14 appearances – a stark difference from Laver’s two triumphs from eight visits.

federer played pretty well at RG in 2005,2006 and 2007 .....just because he won there the first time in 2009 , doesn't mean that was the first time he played well there ......

Is there a brief available?

I don't see a factual error in this article by the world famous expert, except the head to head in majors between Nadal and Federer, which is not 7-2, but 8-2 in my reckoning.

Of course B1 will protest any such discussion that doesn't include Ken Rosewall.

Conspicuously missing from the article is the fact that Federer won 3 out of 4 "open" major titles in 3 out of 4 years from 2004-2007. He didn't win the Grand Slam, but, he dominated as much as anyone has over a 4 year stretch, and then contracted mononucleosis. I don't know how long it took for him to recover from it, but, we all know what it did to Robin Soderling and Andy Roddick. Yet, Federer remained at or near the top for 4 years after contracting mono winning 5 more major titles before regaining the #1 ranking this year. A testiment to Federer's talent and determination.

Not a well thought out or balanced essay, IMO.

Do you know the major tournament and overall H2H on non-clay surfaces?

This is a fair question by Trengove but I think the best way to answer it is with another question: how can Ivan Lendl be proclaimed the best player of the 1980s when he lost so many big matches to Boris Becker?

Becker won all 4 of his Grand Slam meetings with Lendl in the 80s.

I find discussions of who is the GOAT fascinating--even though I myself am hard pressed to give a definitive answer. If Federer had to play in long pants, long sleeves, in canvas tennis shoes or better yet spikes, with a 15-16 oz. wood racquet with no grip--just the bare wood, with gut strings, with white balls, on the courts of the day, could be beat Tilden in his prime? I don't know. If Nadal had to play a 40 yr. old Gonzales and had to use a 65 sq. in. aluminum Spalding Smasher strung with Victor Imperial gut instead of his poly-strung 100 sq. in. graphite Babolat, again in canvas shoes, in short shorts, on fast courts would be win? Again, I don't know, but in both cases I'm inclined to doubt it. We all know about Laver being barred from playing the 'Slams' when he turned pro, but I'm not so sure that statistics like number of titles alone is all that matters. One has to consider the circumstances that lead to those statistics. The comparisons of players from different eras will always be controversial, and I doubt there will ever be a consensus. But I still I find such discussions absolutely fascinating.

One of the missing rivalries of the 80´s was Mac vs Becker.When Becker reached stardom, Mac started his slow but constant decline.He only had a real good tennis year after 1985, and it was 1989, the year Becker became the premier world´s player, but except on their famous DC match,they did not play a big match wherever .

Both were the only guys to win 3 Wimbledon titles in the same decade,as long as I can recall.The match of matches at Wimbledon for the decade of the 80´s.

If you actually think anything Trengrove (who is one of the best writers/journalists that tennis has had) writes is poorly researched and badly written then its a massive indictment on both you and your ability to discern quality writing from fanboy drooling.

To certain people, if it does not laud Federer to the skies and even hints in the subtlest way that he is not the greatest, then it is by definition "poorly researched and badly written."

hold up why is Limp banned?

It is poorly written.

Yep, way to start off your piece under the blanket of objectivity and tolerance for others' views.

If this is quality writing and not fanboy drooling, I'm going to turn in my English degree. Perhaps it's not poorly researched, but it is, quite frankly, literary diarrhea.

It has nothing to do with Trengove's support of Laver. When TC's GOAT list came out, SI's Bruce Jenkins wrote a very good piece which highlighted some of the laughable selections of the list and why he thought Laver was the best ever, while avoiding didactic statements like "true believers."

really now ?

that article is a fanboy drooling one. Not what I wrote .....

I LOL'ed at the use of the phrase "true believers" :)

federer didn't look comfortable until RG 2009 ?

frankly that is a load of cr*p ....

research ? forget research ..... if he had bothered watching a few federer matches RG 2005, 2006,07, he wouldn't be sprouting that sort of BS !

Laver may be the greatest/best of all time, but this article is pretty poor.

He is just a fedfanboy angry

You still dazzed and frustrated that Kodes won 2 RG to your beloved Roger 1?
Laver 3 Slams to Roger 0?
Sampras, Borg and Gonzales would laugh at Federer ridiculous opposition forlong and long years while they played strong eras?

An interesting piece. Thoughtful conclusion.




(The TC list does include some amazing goofs. I'd like to see the same list reconsidered in 30 years.)

Some, if they have the intellectual capacity, should note, that the article is a piece in a whole series of articles (links are on the side), where differerent views and opinions are sampled. The Federer fanboys should read the other piece. Trengove has covered tennis for more than 50 years, he has seen more tennis and more written on tennis than any here together. His books on Davis Cup, Australian Open and Professional Tennis are standard reference works. Actually his book Art of Tennis, written with the cream of the pros as Hoad, Rosewall, Gonzalez, Sedgman, Budge, Segura and Laver, and edited in 8 languages, was the first book on tennis, i have ever read, and it brought me to the sport.

So it is intended as an opinion piece--not as a comparative study?

In other words: blah, blah, blah. I don't care about any of that. You posted a link to an article you claim to be "quite careful[sic] researched and well rounded". The article I read could have been ghostwritten by kiki. I've read some other articles of his via EBSCO and it seems he's just lost a lot off his fastball - he's 82-83 for interested parties. If you just wanted to name drop, fine, you're both entitled your opinions. But don't insult my "intellectual capacity" when I could have found a better article on Bleacher Report in 5 minutes than your "careful researched" gem. Hell, you even had a known Federer-basher and Lavertard in this thread saying the article was garbage.