Top 50 clay couters all time (women)

[granddog29]

Who would be your top 50 clay courters of all time for women. I will do my top 15. I need more time to determine by extended top 50 list. Top 15 in order for now:

1. Chris Evert
2. Steffi Graf
3. Justine Henin
4. Suzanne Lenglen
5. Monica Seles
6. Helen Wills Moody
7. Hilde Sperling
8. Maureen Connolly
9. Simone Mathieu
10. Margaret Court
11. Aranxta Sanchez Vicario
12. Martina Navratilova
13. Ann Jones
14. Serena Williams
15. Gabriela Sabatini

 

[kiki]

matthieu won 7 or 8 FO in the 20´s...

 

[granddog29]

matthieu won 7 or 8 FO in the 20´s...

I did not know about her. Where do you think she should fit on my list.

I realize I forgot Hingis, Goolagong, Mandilikova. I consider those three high quality clay courters, and all but Hingis won RG. Where would you suggest placing those. I also considered Hart and Fry possibly for top 15.

 

[kiki]

I did not know about her. Where do you think she should fit on my list.

I realize I forgot Hingis, Goolagong, Mandilikova. I consider those three high quality clay courters, and all but Hingis won RG. Where would you suggest placing those. I also considered Hart and Fry possibly for top 15.

I read about Simone Mathieu, I think she played in the 10´s or 30´s, not sure but i think she never overlaped with Lenglen; may have been a similar case with Decugis and the Mousk

I like your list.Goolagong and Mandlikova had more success than Hingis, but Hingis reached two FO finals while Goolagong and Mandlikova one ( Hana beat Evert nevertheless and that was big in the 80´s).Not sure they were cc specialists in the classical term but their all round talent was rewarded on clay.I think they´d be top 20.Hart and Fry, definitely top 15.

I know many people will hate what I´ll say but I definitley think that if the ump and crowd have ever had a major part of a final outcome, this has to be the case of Hingis vs Graf in 99 RG.Nothing against Graf, even if she was very unsportsanlike that day.

 

[BTURNER]

Who would be your top 50 clay courters of all time for women.

I'd certainly move Martina ahead of Serena. 2 RG and another 3 finals and three total victories over Evert beats 2 RG with one over Venus. Otherwise I like it well enough.

Edit You forgot

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilde_Krahwinkel_Sperling

From 1935 through 1937, Sperling won three consecutive singles titles at the French Championships. She is one of only four women in history to do so. The others are Moody (1928–1930), Monica Seles (1990–1992), and Justine Henin (2005–2007).
Sperling's only loss on a clay court from 1935 through 1939 was to Simone Mathieu at a tournament in Beaulieu, France in 1937. The score was 7–5, 6–1, and the two sets took 2 hours and 45 minutes to play. Two games alone lasted an hour. It was Mathieu's only victory in 20 meetings...From 1933 through 1939, Sperling won the singles title at the German Championships six consecutive times (the tournament was not held in 1936 because of the Berlin Olympics). This record stood for five decades until Graf won the tournament nine times. Sperling also won the singles title at the Italian Championships in 1935 and defeated Moody in a semifinal of the 1938 Queens Club London championships,[3] just before Moody won her eighth Wimbledon singles title. Sperling's last international singles title was at the 1950 Scandinavian Covered Courts Championships in Copenhagen, Denmark when she was 41 years old. Sperling won several championships in Denmark while that country was occupied by Germany during World War II. Sperling never entered the U.S. Championships because of scheduling conflicts with the German Championships

I think she is up there between 5-9.

 

[granddog29]

Thanks for your useful info. I have adjusted my original list accordingly. Anymore useful recommendations is more than welcome.

 

[Gizo]

I'm not saying Seles should be bumped up any more, but has there ever been a stronger clay court field in women's tennis than in the early 90s?

Obviously historically there have always been less surface specialists and depth in women's tennis compared to men's, with clay often bringing out the worst in a lot of the girls. However from 1990-1992 Seles was dominating a clay court field with Graf, ASV and Sabatini, plus Martinez wasn't at her peak but still an emerging talent.

 

[BTURNER]

Thanks for your useful info. I have adjusted my original list accordingly. Anymore useful recommendations is more than welcome.

I can't improve on it now. Looks very good indeed.

 

[granddog29]

I'm not saying Seles should be bumped up any more, but has there ever been a stronger clay court field in women's tennis than in the early 90s?

Obviously historically there have always been less surface specialists and depth in women's tennis compared to men's, with clay often bringing out the worst in a lot of the girls. However from 1990-1992 Seles was dominating a clay court field with Graf, ASV and Sabatini, plus Martinez wasn't at her peak but still an emerging talent.

I do agree the Graf-Seles era had the deepest clay court era ever. That was a swaying factor in my ranking Graf 2nd (although her numbers alone merit it). I even considered ranking her 1st over Evert due to the quality of competition, but decided it would be unfair to punish Chris for not always having the best clay competition when she couldnt help that, and her amazing feats, consistency, and long term excellence on clay have to be recognized. That plus the stigma of the Seles stabbing would make it hard to rank someone with 6 Frenchswith a black mark of sorts next to that over someone who in reality should have 10 Frenchs for sure (Chris missing 76-78 all which she was a lock for), regardless of the difference in the depth of the field.


Perhaps I overrank Henin and Lenglen in comparision to Seles given the massive difference in quality of the fields they faced on the surface. Also given how evenly matched Graf and Seles were on clay, and Seles having the better in fact pre stabbing, perhaps it would be fair to consider ranking Seles right behind Graf. 3-5 spots are very close though and hard to rank.

I can't improve on it now. Looks very good indeed.

Thank you. Could you give me some suggestions for the 16-30 group. I am currently working on that section of players and where they should rank. I believe that Nancy Richey, Lesley Turner, Conchita Martinez (despite the lack of a French Open title), Mary Pierce, Shirley Fry, Doris Hart, Martina Hingis (despite the lack of a French Open title), Hana Mandilikova, and Evonne Goolagong, are the players who would for now make up my 16-24 in some order though.

 

[BTURNER]

I'm not saying Seles should be bumped up any more, but has there ever been a stronger clay court field in women's tennis than in the early 90s?

Obviously historically there have always been less surface specialists and depth in women's tennis compared to men's, with clay often bringing out the worst in a lot of the girls. However from 1990-1992 Seles was dominating a clay court field with Graf, ASV and Sabatini, plus Martinez wasn't at her peak but still an emerging talent.

Oh I agree entirely. It was one of the great clay eras of all time, and I think the rankings reflect that, virtually the whole generation is included in this list, even Sabatini who never reached a RG final. In any other era, she'd have two or three titles in France to go along with those Italians she did win. The seedings in Europe were a who's who of fine clay courters.

But for Evert's total domination on green clay to accent her red trophies, including the well attended US Open fields, I'd move Graf over her. But you just can't beat that streak began in 1973, with so few sets lost, and then a post- Austin one for two more years. If I recall it was 94% w/l career record on clay.

 

[kiki]

I do agree the Graf-Seles era had the deepest clay court era ever. That was a swaying factor in my ranking Graf 2nd (although her numbers alone merit it). I even considered ranking her 1st over Evert due to the quality of competition, but decided it would be unfair to punish Chris for not always having the best clay competition when she couldnt help that, and her amazing feats, consistency, and long term excellence on clay have to be recognized. That plus the stigma of the Seles stabbing would make it hard to rank someone with 6 Frenchswith a black mark of sorts next to that over someone who in reality should have 10 Frenchs for sure (Chris missing 76-78 all which she was a lock for), regardless of the difference in the depth of the field.


Perhaps I overrank Henin and Lenglen in comparision to Seles given the massive difference in quality of the fields they faced on the surface. Also given how evenly matched Graf and Seles were on clay, and Seles having the better in fact pre stabbing, perhaps it would be fair to consider ranking Seles right behind Graf. 3-5 spots are very close though and hard to rank.





Thank you. Could you give me some suggestions for the 16-30 group. I am currently working on that section of players and where they should rank. I believe that Nancy Richey, Lesley Turner, Conchita Martinez (despite the lack of a French Open title), Mary Pierce, Shirley Fry, Doris Hart, Martina Hingis (despite the lack of a French Open title), Hana Mandilikova, and Evonne Goolagong, are the players who would for now make up my 16-24 in some order though.

Amazing Conchita: she won the slam she had the least business winning but never won RG and she was definitely a cc specialist
Look at her record at Berlin/Rome/Hilton Head/Amelia Island...the cc equivalent to a current TMS

 

[Gizo]

Good comments.

Just on subjective viewing, I would definitely take a peak Seles over a peak Henin on clay. Seles just seemed a lot more imposing to me and she was dominating a better clay court field than Henin was. Is that enough to offset Henin's one extra RG title?

Well despite Seles being out of RG for 3 years in her prime from 1993-1995, her record there is similar to Henin's. Henin has 4 titles and one semi-final appearance where she choked against Clijsters in 2001. Seles has 3 titles, 1 final appearance where she lost to ASV in 1998, and 3 semi-final appearances where she lost to Graf in 1989 and 1999 and Hingis in 1997.

Henin won 3 titles at Berlin, 2 at Charleston and 2 at Warsaw. Seles won 2 at Rome, 1 at Berlin and 2 at Amelia Island.

I can understand arguments for ranking one over the other.

I do think that Evert deserves to be firmly at the top though due to her incredible body of work on clay, and day in day out reliability on the surface.