Surprising AO winners

[kiki]

Since 1968, there have been 4 surprising winners at Melbourne.

Bill Bowrey won the last amateur championships beating a superior player, Juan Gisbert, who had excellent doubles results later on.

Edmondson was respected as a great grass court specialists and has a very good grass record, but beating Newk and Rosewall back to back to win the title was completely astonishing, in 76

Same could be said of Brian Teacher, who was a dangerous player, and had already established himself as a very good professional tennis player by the time he surprisingly won the 1981 event.

Thomas Johansson was completely unknown but his final win over Safin in 2002 was very well deserved.

Some will say Korda and Kriek ( 2 times winner), but they were already top ten players who had a bit of luck with the draw.Korda had already played a major final (RG 92) while, at the very beginning of the 80´s, most tennis experts predicted either Mac or Lendl or Kriek to be the successors to Bjorn Borg.

[Xavier G]

I never saw Bill Bowrey, Kiki, but his name is in the records books as AO winner 1968.
Edmondson winning was a surprise, and two great names to have wins over. Edmondson could so easily have knocked out Borg early in Wimbledon 77, I think. He reached the Wimbledon semis in 1982, beating Gerulaitis, before Connors demolished him in reality, but it's clear Mark Edmondson was a good grass court player.
I had heard of Brian Teacher because he had beaten Connors in the Tokyo tournament 1978 so he could be dangerous, a good server.

I wasn't too surprised Johan Kriek won in those years.

Of course, the AO wasn't being played with full strength fields in these years. About from 1983 onwards, it picked up again.

I suppose you could call a 19 year old Edberg winning in 1985 a surprise too. I thought Lendl, Becker, Wilander and possibly Mac all had chances.

[ollinger]

Beating Newk and Rosewall back to back in 1976 was "completely astonishing"??? Newk was 32 at the time and Rosewall was 42; NOT beating at least one of them would have been even more astonishing. One also needs to remember that in the early days of the open era, the AO was a tournament many players skipped as it was played in December back then and not everyone wanted to disrupt the Christmas season to fly half way around the world to play on an unfamiliar surface (grass back then, in the middle of the indoor season).

[ollinger]

(and Johansson was anything but "completely unknown" at the time. He was already a well regarded player, though not someone you expected to get to a slam final.)

[Bursztyn]

Well, perhaps it wasn't a great suprise when Becker won the event in 1996, but still his results in Australia after 1991 were mediocre for a player of his caliber.

Then he won out of the blue.

Of course he had some very good results at Wimbledon after 1991, and some good results at US Open too.

[kiki]

Originally Posted by Xavier G

I never saw Bill Bowrey, Kiki, but his name is in the records books as AO winner 1968.
Edmondson winning was a surprise, and two great names to have wins over. Edmondson could so easily have knocked out Borg early in Wimbledon 77, I think. He reached the Wimbledon semis in 1982, beating Gerulaitis, before Connors demolished him in reality, but it's clear Mark Edmondson was a good grass court player.
I had heard of Brian Teacher because he had beaten Connors in the Tokyo tournament 1978 so he could be dangerous, a good server.

I wasn't too surprised Johan Kriek won in those years.

Of course, the AO wasn't being played with full strength fields in these years. About from 1983 onwards, it picked up again.

I suppose you could call a 19 year old Edberg winning in 1985 a surprise too. I thought Lendl, Becker, Wilander and possibly Mac all had chances.

yes they all had better chances than Edberg although it was just a matter of time for Stefan to have a fist major win.

Kriek was already on his way up, it didn´t surprise me at all that he had won the AO, either.Denton, on a given day, with that big big serve was a danger on grass.

[Mustard]

Originally Posted by ollinger

Beating Newk and Rosewall back to back in 1976 was "completely astonishing"??? Newk was 32 at the time and Rosewall was 42; NOT beating at least one of them would have been even more astonishing.

Newcombe was defending champion and was definitely one of the top 2 players in the world less than a year earlier. And Rosewall was very experienced, and still very good at 41. Edmondson was ranked at 212 in the world.

[galain]

Johannson wasn't an unknown when he won in Australia. He was a surprise winner, but it's not like he appeared from nowhere.

As an aside - from years going to the AO and watching from courtside, Johannson is one of the players who impressed me the most. I thought he was incredible.

[kiki]

even more than the champions, the surprising runner ups list is bigger, but it only tells the lack of depth.Guys like Gisbert,Crealy,LLoyd, Parun,Dent,Sadri,Warwick,Denton would never reach a Wimbledon or Open final, not that they were not talented.Specially Dent,Sadri.Denton had a big 1982 year but disappeared by 1984.

Mal Anderson had won the open back in 57 and was too past his prime to expect him in the 72 final.He lost to a guy of his age...Ken Rosewall.
I would say only the following finals were to be expected:

Laver-Gimeno ( 69)
Rosewall-Ashe ( 71)
Newcombe-Connors (75)
Tanner-Vilas (77)

at least till 1983, when the top players came back to play down there.

[BobbyOne]

Originally Posted by kiki

even more than the champions, the surprising runner ups list is bigger, but it only tells the lack of depth.Guys like Gisbert,Crealy,LLoyd, Parun,Dent,Sadri,Warwick,Denton would never reach a Wimbledon or Open final, not that they were not talented.Specially Dent,Sadri.Denton had a big 1982 year but disappeared by 1984.

Mal Anderson had won the open back in 57 and was too past his prime to expect him in the 72 final.He lost to a guy of his age...Ken Rosewall.
I would say only the following finals were to be expected:

Laver-Gimeno ( 69)
Rosewall-Ashe ( 71)
Newcombe-Connors (75)
Tanner-Vilas (77)

at least till 1983, when the top players came back to play down there.

kiki, good analysis.

I think Gimeno in 1969 was a (little) surprise. Rosewall should have reached the final.

[kiki]

Originally Posted by BobbyOne

kiki, good analysis.

I think Gimeno in 1969 was a(little) surprise. Rosewall should have reached the final.

Gimeno was a solid top tenner.He could beat Rosewall any time even if Ken was the favourite .

[BobbyOne]

Originally Posted by kiki

Gimeno was a solid top tenner.He could beat Rosewall any time even if Ken was the favourite .

Here you are right. I'm an old Gimeno admirer.

[tennisplayer1993]

Thomas Johannson comes to mind