Players who you only know because of one match

I think answers in a thread like this will always vary based on when people started watching tennis, degree of their interest in major/minor tournaments, which players they tend to watch more matches of, matches that have more meaning to them etc.

Kind of surprised to see some of the names get dropped tho. Gilles Muller was quite famous before WIM 17 for upsetting Roddick in 05 USO 1R. Beat Nadal at 05 WIM as well. He also had a damn good run at 08 USO; came back from 2 sets down twice, took out Davydenko and lost to Fed in the QF getting his serve broken only once.

Younes had upset world number one Hewitt before the Roddick match, that's something that doesn't get brought up that much. He had MP on Hewitt at IW that year too (BTW watching that point play out, you would have been sure Younes would've won the match but then Hewitt went on to win the tournament convincingly). He also had multiple other GS QFs runs as another poster mentioned.

Schuettler made it to world number 5 at one point, finished top 10 in 03, made SF at TMC that year and was AO runner up as well (do think he benefited a lot from the draw as well tho).
 
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Phoenix1983 said:
I don't remember a specific match involving him
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His quartefinal match versus Philippoussis was quite memorable. Took an early 2-0 lead but some rain interruptions along with the recovery of the Australian, prevented him from reaching his maiden semi final. I still remember the dive volley of Philippoussis in saving a crucial break point at the fifth set...
 
Rogr Fedr. That Swiss scrub who almost beat Djovak at Wimbledon but his backhand wasn't quite as pretty as Djokovic's that day.
 
QuadCam said:
Unreal you follow doubles, most people wouldn't recall nico mahut other than the wimbledon marathon match. Even still, i think most people only remember Isner from that match.
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Unfortunately people also remember Isner from his semi-final with Anderson in 2018.
 
BeatlesFan said:
I think Bastl defeating Sampras in the second round in 2002 was bigger, Doohan beating Becker in the second round in 1987 was a biggie too.
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Doohan possibly. Bastl, I don't think so.
Sampras had already struggled the year before, before being knocked out by Federer.
In the run up to Wimbledon he was not in great form. He was dumped out of Halle in straight sets by Kiefer.
He hadn't won a title since Wimbledon 2000.
He was on Court 2 for a reason. It looked like all his motivation had gone after breaking Emerson's record.

But Federer was imperious in the 1st round, had won Halle and his bogeyman, Nadal, had been dumped out by Darcis. Should have been plain sailing to the final but Stakhovsky had other ideas.
 
Vijay Amritraj almost caused a sensation at Wimbledon 1979, leading 2-1 in sets over Björn Borg (three-time defending champion) and having a break in the 4th set. I always remember at this 2nd round match (Borg won this match 2:6, 6:4, 4:6, 7:6, 6:2), when Amritraj is mentioned.
 
BeatlesFan said:
I think Bastl defeating Sampras in the second round in 2002 was bigger, Doohan beating Becker in the second round in 1987 was a biggie too.
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Bastl was also Murray's first win at Wimbledon IIRC.

Not that that's a huge feat but it's a really random thing I remember.
 
GA Tech’s Bryan Shelton beating Mika Stich in the first rd of 1994 Wimbledon. Number 2 court, nicknamed the graveyard of champions. Straight sets, if i recall correctly.
 
Mainad said:
Marco Cecchinato.

Anybody heard of him since he beat Djokovic at 2018 RG?
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He is remembered for his sublime hard-court record, especially back in 2018 (hadn't won a match on HC at the tour level when he beat Novak). Of course Gilles manages to lose to him on HC that year, such a nice guy.
 
some for the ladies

Marlene Weingartner- AO 2003
Jill Craybas- Wimbledon 2005
Roberta Vinci- USO 2015 (established player especially in doubles but she didn't really become a mainstream name until she upset Serena here)
 
Phoenix1983 said:
For such a large population, USSR/Russia has a rather poor record in tennis.

:whistle:
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It was a difficult situation with tennis very long in the USSR. First it was recognise as a "non working class sport", you know what it does mean in communist regime, also tennis was not an olympic sport for a long period, and it wasn't interested for soviet sports chiefs who payed attention mostly to olympic medals race against capitalists countries and also it was a political decision of soviet heads did not to play against SA that leaded to ban the soviet players from all international tournaments for a certain period.
 
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Enceladus said:
Vijay Amritraj almost caused a sensation at Wimbledon 1979, leading 2-1 in sets over Björn Borg (three-time defending champion) and having a break in the 4th set. I always remember at this 2nd round match (Borg won this match 2:6, 6:4, 4:6, 7:6, 6:2), when Amritraj is mentioned.
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Vijay was a strong player.
 
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Thomaz Belluci - just so happened to watch him bagel Djokovic at the Rome Masters 2016 in the first set. Had never (that I could remember) come across him before nor have ever again. Mad first set where he just kept hitting improbable winners and it was really interesting watching Novak wrestle back control early in the second set then pull away from him.
 
I wish my recall was better, and am too lazy to verify.
It seems that way back, Paul Haarhuis (Holland) upset McEnroe at the US Open, but did he also take out Boris another year? Not a bad player, but don't think he was ever Top 15 even, and perhaps, one of those times he made a slam QF.
@BeatlesFan, Do you recall Haarhuis, or this match? Maybe, it wasn't that significant, but just a name and memory that registered.
 
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