1.
Australia
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Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. It is the worlds sixth-largest country by total area, the neighbouring countries are Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and East Timor to the north, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu to the north-east, and New Zealand to the south-east. Australias capital is Canberra, and its largest urban area is Sydney, for about 50,000 years before the first British settlement in the late 18th century, Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians, who spoke languages classifiable into roughly 250 groups. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the 1850s most of the continent had been explored, on 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy comprising six states. The population of 24 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard, Australia has the worlds 13th-largest economy and ninth-highest per capita income. With the second-highest human development index globally, the country highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom. The name Australia is derived from the Latin Terra Australis a name used for putative lands in the southern hemisphere since ancient times, the Dutch adjectival form Australische was used in a Dutch book in Batavia in 1638, to refer to the newly discovered lands to the south. On 12 December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted, in 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially as Australia. The first official published use of the term Australia came with the 1830 publication of The Australia Directory and these first inhabitants may have been ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, were originally horticulturists, the northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by fishermen from Maritime Southeast Asia. The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the Duyfken captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, the Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent New Holland during the 17th century, but made no attempt at settlement. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688, in 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain. The first settlement led to the foundation of Sydney, and the exploration, a British settlement was established in Van Diemens Land, now known as Tasmania, in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. The United Kingdom formally claimed the part of Western Australia in 1828. Separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales, South Australia in 1836, Victoria in 1851, the Northern Territory was founded in 1911 when it was excised from South Australia
2.
Rod Laver
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Rodney George Rod Laver AC, MBE is an Australian former tennis player widely regarded as one of the greatest in tennis history. He was the No.1 ranked professional from 1964 to 1970, spanning four years before and he also was the No.1 amateur in 1961–62 according to Lance Tingay. He excelled on all of the surfaces of his time, grass, clay, hard, carpet. Despite being banned from playing the Grand Slam tournaments for the five prior to the Open Era. He is the player to twice achieve the calendar-year Grand Slam, in 1962 and 1969. Rodney George Laver was born in Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia and he was the third of four children of Roy Laver, a cattleman and butcher, and his wife Melba Roffey. In 1966 Laver, aged 27, married Mary Benson in San Rafael, born Mary Shelby Peterson in Illinois, she was a divorcee with three children. Laver and Mary had a son and the family lived at various locations in California including Rancho Mirage, Corona del Mar, Mary Laver died in November 2012 at the age of 84 at their home in Carlsbad. Although of a short and medium build, Laver developed a technically complete serve-and-volley game. Dan Maskell, the Voice of Wimbledon, described him as technically faultless and his left-handed serve was well disguised and wide swinging. His groundstrokes on both flanks were hit with topspin, as was the attacking topspin lob, which Laver developed into a weapon and his stroke technique was based on quick shoulder turns, true swings, and accurate timing. His backhand, often hit on the run, was a point-ender that gave him an advantage, Laver was very quick and had a strong left forearm. Rex Bellamy wrote, The strength of that wrist and forearm gave him blazing power without loss of control, even when he was on the run, the combination of speed and strength, especially wrist strength, enabled him to hit ferocious winners when way out of court. At the net, he had forcing volleys, often hit as stroke volleys, especially on the backhand, he could hit sharp underspin angles as well. He was difficult to lob, because of his agility. As an amateur, Laver was a flashy player, often a late starter. He had to learn to control his adventurous shot-making and integrate percentage tennis into his game when he turned professional, in his prime, he could adapt his style to all surfaces and to all conditions. Laver had a record in five-set-matches, often turning things around with subtle changes of tactics
3.
Australian Open
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The Australian Open is a major tennis tournament held annually over the last fortnight of January in Melbourne, Australia. First held in 1905, the tournament is chronologically the first of the four Grand Slam tennis events of the year – the other three being the French Open, Wimbledon and the US Open. It features mens and womens singles, mens, womens and mixed doubles and juniors championships, as well as wheelchair, legends, the Australian Open typically has high attendances, rivalling and occasionally exceeding the US Open. The tournament holds the record for the highest attendance at a Grand Slam event, the Australian Open is managed by Tennis Australia, formerly the Lawn Tennis Association of Australia, and was first played at the Warehousemans Cricket Ground in Melbourne in November 1905. This facility is now known as the Albert Reserve Tennis Centre, the tournament was first known as the Australasian Championships and then became the Australian Championships in 1927 and the Australian Open in 1969. Since 1905, the Australian Open has been staged in five Australian and two New Zealand cities, Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, Brisbane, Perth, Christchurch and Hastings. Though started in 1905, the tournament was not designated as being a championship until 1924. The tournament committee changed the structure of the tournament to include seeding at that time, in 1972, it was decided to stage the tournament in Melbourne each year because it attracted the biggest patronage of any Australian city. The tournament was played at the Kooyong Lawn Tennis Club from 1972 until the move to the new Melbourne Park complex in 1988, the new facilities at Melbourne Park were envisaged to meet the demands of a tournament that had outgrown Kooyongs capacity. The move to Melbourne Park was an success, with a 90 percent increase in attendance in 1988 on the previous year at Kooyong. Because of Australias geographic remoteness, very few foreign players entered this tournament in the early 20th century, in the 1920s, the trip by ship from Europe to Australia took about 45 days. The first tennis players who came by boats were the US Davis Cup players in November 1946, even inside the country, many players could not travel easily. When the tournament was held in Perth, no one from Victoria or New South Wales crossed by train, in Christchurch in 1906, of a small field of 10 players, only two Australians attended and the tournament was won by a New Zealander. The first tournaments of the Australasian Championships suffered from the competition of the other Australasian tournaments, before 1905, all Australian states and New Zealand had their own championships, the first organised in 1880 in Melbourne and called the Championship of the Colony of Victoria. In those years, the best two players – Australian Norman Brookes and New Zealander Anthony Wilding – almost did not play this tournament, Brookes came once and won in 1911, and Wilding entered and won the competition twice. Their meetings in the Victorian Championships helped to determine the best Australasian players, even when the Australasian Championships were held in Hastings, New Zealand, in 1912, Wilding, though three times Wimbledon champion, did not come back to his home country. It was a problem for all players of the era. Brookes went to Europe only three times, where he reached the Wimbledon Challenge Round once and then won Wimbledon twice
4.
United Kingdom
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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom or Britain, is a sovereign country in western Europe. Lying off the north-western coast of the European mainland, the United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea lies between Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world and the 11th-largest in Europe. It is also the 21st-most populous country, with an estimated 65.1 million inhabitants, together, this makes it the fourth-most densely populated country in the European Union. The United Kingdom is a monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. The monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, other major urban areas in the United Kingdom include the regions of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. The United Kingdom consists of four countries—England, Scotland, Wales, the last three have devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in their capitals, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, respectively. The relationships among the countries of the UK have changed over time, Wales was annexed by the Kingdom of England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. A treaty between England and Scotland resulted in 1707 in a unified Kingdom of Great Britain, which merged in 1801 with the Kingdom of Ireland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, there are fourteen British Overseas Territories. These are the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. The United Kingdom is a country and has the worlds fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP. The UK is considered to have an economy and is categorised as very high in the Human Development Index. It was the worlds first industrialised country and the worlds foremost power during the 19th, the UK remains a great power with considerable economic, cultural, military, scientific and political influence internationally. It is a nuclear weapons state and its military expenditure ranks fourth or fifth in the world. The UK has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946 and it has been a leading member state of the EU and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. However, on 23 June 2016, a referendum on the UKs membership of the EU resulted in a decision to leave. The Acts of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved self-government
5.
West Germany
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West Germany is the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation on 23 May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990. During this Cold War era, NATO-aligned West Germany and Warsaw Pact-aligned East Germany were divided by the Inner German border, after 1961 West Berlin was physically separated from East Berlin as well as from East Germany by the Berlin Wall. This situation ended when East Germany was dissolved and its five states joined the ten states of the Federal Republic of Germany along with the reunified city-state of Berlin. With the reunification of West and East Germany, the Federal Republic of Germany, enlarged now to sixteen states and this period is referred to as the Bonn Republic by historians, alluding to the interwar Weimar Republic and the post-reunification Berlin Republic. The Federal Republic of Germany was established from eleven states formed in the three Allied Zones of occupation held by the United States, the United Kingdom and France, US and British forces remained in the country throughout the Cold War. Its population grew from roughly 51 million in 1950 to more than 63 million in 1990, the city of Bonn was its de facto capital city. The fourth Allied occupation zone was held by the Soviet Union, as a result, West Germany had a territory about half the size of the interbellum democratic Weimar Republic. At the onset of the Cold War, Europe was divided among the Western and Eastern blocs, Germany was de facto divided into two countries and two special territories, the Saarland and divided Berlin. The Federal Republic of Germany claimed a mandate for all of Germany. It took the line that the GDR was an illegally constituted puppet state, though the GDR did hold regular elections, these were not free and fair. For all practical purposes the GDR was a Soviet puppet state, from the West German perspective the GDR was therefore illegitimate. Three southwestern states of West Germany merged to form Baden-Württemberg in 1952, in addition to the resulting ten states, West Berlin was considered an unofficial de facto 11th state. It recognised the GDR as a de facto government within a single German nation that in turn was represented de jure by the West German state alone. From 1973 onward, East Germany recognised the existence of two German countries de jure, and the West as both de facto and de jure foreign country, the Federal Republic and the GDR agreed that neither of them could speak in the name of the other. The first chancellor Konrad Adenauer, who remained in office until 1963, had worked for an alignment with NATO rather than neutrality. He not only secured a membership in NATO but was also a proponent of agreements that developed into the present-day European Union, when the G6 was established in 1975, there was no question whether the Federal Republic of Germany would be a member as well. With the collapse of communism in Central and Eastern Europe in 1989, symbolised by the opening of the Berlin Wall, East Germany voted to dissolve itself and accede to the Federal Republic in 1990. Its five post-war states were reconstituted along with the reunited Berlin and they formally joined the Federal Republic on 3 October 1990, raising the number of states from 10 to 16, ending the division of Germany
6.
Italy
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Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a unitary parliamentary republic in Europe. Located in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, Italy shares open land borders with France, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, San Marino, Italy covers an area of 301,338 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate and Mediterranean climate. Due to its shape, it is referred to in Italy as lo Stivale. With 61 million inhabitants, it is the fourth most populous EU member state, the Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom, which eventually became a republic that conquered and assimilated other nearby civilisations. The legacy of the Roman Empire is widespread and can be observed in the distribution of civilian law, republican governments, Christianity. The Renaissance began in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe, bringing a renewed interest in humanism, science, exploration, Italian culture flourished at this time, producing famous scholars, artists and polymaths such as Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, Michelangelo and Machiavelli. The weakened sovereigns soon fell victim to conquest by European powers such as France, Spain and Austria. Despite being one of the victors in World War I, Italy entered a period of economic crisis and social turmoil. The subsequent participation in World War II on the Axis side ended in defeat, economic destruction. Today, Italy has the third largest economy in the Eurozone and it has a very high level of human development and is ranked sixth in the world for life expectancy. The country plays a prominent role in regional and global economic, military, cultural and diplomatic affairs, as a reflection of its cultural wealth, Italy is home to 51 World Heritage Sites, the most in the world, and is the fifth most visited country. The assumptions on the etymology of the name Italia are very numerous, according to one of the more common explanations, the term Italia, from Latin, Italia, was borrowed through Greek from the Oscan Víteliú, meaning land of young cattle. The bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes and was often depicted goring the Roman wolf as a defiant symbol of free Italy during the Social War. Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus states this account together with the legend that Italy was named after Italus, mentioned also by Aristotle and Thucydides. The name Italia originally applied only to a part of what is now Southern Italy – according to Antiochus of Syracuse, but by his time Oenotria and Italy had become synonymous, and the name also applied to most of Lucania as well. The Greeks gradually came to apply the name Italia to a larger region, excavations throughout Italy revealed a Neanderthal presence dating back to the Palaeolithic period, some 200,000 years ago, modern Humans arrived about 40,000 years ago. Other ancient Italian peoples of undetermined language families but of possible origins include the Rhaetian people and Cammuni. Also the Phoenicians established colonies on the coasts of Sardinia and Sicily, the Roman legacy has deeply influenced the Western civilisation, shaping most of the modern world
7.
Roy Emerson
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Roy Stanley Emerson is an Australian former World number one tennis player who won 12 Major singles titles and 16 Grand Slam tournament mens doubles titles. He is the male player to have completed a Career Grand Slam in both singles and doubles. His 28 major titles are a record for a male amateur player. Roy Emerson is the first male player to win each amateur major title at least twice in his career and he is one of only eight men to win all four majors in his career. He was the first male player to win 12 majors, along with Novak Djokovic, he is one of only two male players to win 6 Australian Championships. He won five of them consecutively and his 12 wins have since been surpassed. Emerson is only one of five tennis players all-time to win multiple slam sets in two disciplines, only matched by Margaret Court, Martina Navratilova, Frank Sedgman and Serena Williams, Emerson was born on a farm in Blackbutt, Queensland. His family later moved to Brisbane and he received better tennis instruction after attending Brisbane Grammar School, Emerson won his first Grand Slam tournament doubles title in 1959 at Wimbledon. In 1961, he captured his first Grand Slam tournament singles title at the Australian Championships, later that year, Emerson claimed his second major singles crown when he again beat Laver in the final of the US Championships. Affectionately known as Emmo on the tour, the six-foot right-hander was known for training hard and he was primarily a serve-and-volley style player, but was also able to adapt to the rigours of slow courts, allowing him to enjoy success on all surfaces. From 1963 to 1967, Emerson won five consecutive singles titles at the Australian Championships. His six Australian singles crowns are a record for a male player,1963 also saw Emerson capture his first French Championships singles title, beating Pierre Darmon in the final. Emersons first Wimbledon singles title came in 1964, with a victory over Fred Stolle. Emerson won 55 consecutive matches during 1964 and finished the year with 109 victories out of 115 matches and he won three of the years four Grand Slam events that year. During his amateur career Emerson received several offers to turn professional, including an £38,000 offer made at the end of 1964 by Jack Kramer, but declined and opted to remain an amateur. Emerson was the World No.1 amateur player in 1964 and 1965 according to Lance Tingay of The Daily Telegraph, in 1965, he successfully defended his Australian and Wimbledon singles crowns. He was the favourite to win Wimbledon again in 1966. He still finished the match, but was unable to win, emersons last major singles title came at the French Championships in 1967 – the year before the open era began
8.
Ken Fletcher
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Kenneth Norman Fletcher was an Australian tennis player who won numerous doubles and mixed doubles Grand Slam titles. He was born in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia to parents Norm and he was educated at St Laurences College and showed early promise as a championship tennis player there. His greatest success as a player came in 1963, when he became the only man to win a calendar year Grand Slam in mixed doubles. He reached the final of the Australian Open in 1963, losing to Roy Emerson, after this achievement, he went on to record mixed doubles championships in the Australian Open in 1964, French Open in 1964 and 1965, and Wimbledon in 1965,1966, and 1968. All of his mixed doubles Grand Slam titles were in partnership with Smith Court and he also achieved a Grand Slam title in mens doubles in the 1964 French Open, playing with Roy Emerson. At the Wimbledon mens doubles championship, he was a finalist with Robert Hewitt in 1965, the champion in 1966 partnering John Newcombe, in total Fletcher won 27 international tennis titles. He was ranked World No.10 in 1966 by Lance Tingay of The Daily Telegraph, Ken was a larrikin by nature, and many of his exploits feature in Hugh Lunns books, especially Over the Top with Jim and Head Over Heels. In later years he was instrumental in gaining significant funding for research in Australia. In 2008 Hugh Lunn published a book on Kens remarkable life around the globe, Fletcher died of cancer at the age of 65 and was buried at the Mount Gravatt Lawn Cemetery, Brisbane. In January 2012 Ken Fletcher was inducted into the Australian Tennis Hall of Fame, in 2013 the Ken Fletcher memorial was erected in the park, outside the Queensland Tennis Centre, named in his honour. He is the player in the history of tennis, to win a grand slam, in mixed doubles. ATP Player Profile Hugh Lunns Website, Vale by Hugh Lunn Australian Open Player Profile Lunn, the Great Fletch, The Dazzling Life of Wimbledon Aussie Larrikin Ken Fletcher ISBN 0-7333-2209-3
9.
Bob Hewitt
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Robert Anthony John Bob Hewitt is a former professional tennis player from Australia. In 1967, after marrying a South African, he became a South African citizen, Hewitts most significant accomplishment was winning all Grand Slam doubles titles, both in mens and mixed doubles and being central to South Africas only Davis Cup title in 1974. Hewitt achieved seven titles in singles and 65 in doubles and he was ranked World No.6 in 1967 by Lance Tingay of The Daily Telegraph. In 1992 he was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame, on 23 March 2015, Hewitt was found guilty of rape and sexual assault and subsequently jailed for six years on 18 May 2015. On 6 April 2016 he was expelled from the Tennis Hall of Fame for his convictions, on 9 June 2016 his appeal against his sentence was denied and he was jailed for 6 years. In 2011, an investigation by the Boston Globe disclosed allegations from one adult woman who was coached as a girl by Hewitts assistant coach. The investigation was prompted by the revelations of a student in March 2011, She claimed that, beginning in the 1970s. Interviews with contemporaries, in the United States and South Africa, the South African Tennis Union investigated after 1992, but no legal action was ever taken against Hewitt. The Boston Globes investigation and report of the victim has prompted the request and was followed up by a signed by his alleged victim asking for his removal from the Hall of Fame. A November 2011 investigative piece by Mary Carillo of HBOs Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel includes interviews with the alleged victim, Hewitt did not agree to be interviewed for the piece. In May 2012, Hewitts one-time mixed doubles partner Billie Jean King spoke to the Washingtonian and we won the French Open together in 1970. On 15 November 2012, after months of investigation, Hewitt was deprived of his accolade in the International Tennis Hall of Fame and his legacy ceases to exist in the Hall of Fame, said Mark Stenning, executive director of the International Tennis Hall of Fame. As of today, his plaque will be removed from the Hall of Fame and his name will be removed from our website and all other materials, and from the perspective of the Hall of Fame, he is suspended from the Hall of Fame. On 6 April 2016, Hewitt was permanently expelled from the Tennis Hall of Fame, Hewitt was charged with rape in June 2014 and went on trial in 2015. On 23 March 2015, Hewitt was found guilty of two counts of rape and one of assault by the South Gauteng High Court in South Africa and was sentenced in May to an effective six years in jail. Bob Hewitt at the Association of Tennis Professionals Bob Hewitt at the International Tennis Federation Bob Hewitt at the Davis Cup Daily Liberal – City served him well Real Sports
Roy Emerson
Rod Laver (Finalist)
Mike Sangster (Quarterfinalist)
Christian Kuhnke (Quarterfinalist)
Sergio Tacchini (Second round)
Christian Kuhnke
Mike Sangster
Tan
Tacchini