1.
Romania
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Romania is a sovereign state located in Southeastern Europe. It borders the Black Sea, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Hungary, Serbia and it has an area of 238,391 square kilometres and a temperate-continental climate. With over 19 million inhabitants, the country is the member state of the European Union. Its capital and largest city, Bucharest, is the sixth-largest city in the EU, the River Danube, Europes second-longest river, rises in Germany and flows in a general southeast direction for 2,857 km, coursing through ten countries before emptying into Romanias Danube Delta. The Carpathian Mountains, which cross Romania from the north to the southwest are marked by one of their tallest peaks, Moldoveanu, modern Romania was formed in 1859 through a personal union of the Danubian Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia. The new state, officially named Romania since 1866, gained independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1877, at the end of World War I, Transylvania, Bukovina and Bessarabia united with the sovereign Kingdom of Romania. Romania lost several territories, of which Northern Transylvania was regained after the war, following the war, Romania became a socialist republic and member of the Warsaw Pact. After the 1989 Revolution, Romania began a transition back towards democracy and it has been a member of NATO since 2004, and part of the European Union since 2007. A strong majority of the population identify themselves as Eastern Orthodox Christians and are speakers of Romanian. The cultural history of Romania is often referred to when dealing with artists, musicians, inventors. For similar reasons, Romania has been the subject of notable tourist attractions, Romania derives from the Latin romanus, meaning citizen of Rome. The first known use of the appellation was attested in the 16th century by Italian humanists travelling in Transylvania, Moldavia, after the abolition of serfdom in 1746, the word rumân gradually fell out of use and the spelling stabilised to the form român. Tudor Vladimirescu, a leader of the early 19th century. The use of the name Romania to refer to the homeland of all Romanians—its modern-day meaning—was first documented in the early 19th century. The name has been officially in use since 11 December 1861, in English, the name of the country was formerly spelt Rumania or Roumania. Romania became the predominant spelling around 1975, Romania is also the official English-language spelling used by the Romanian government. The Neolithic-Age Cucuteni area in northeastern Romania was the region of the earliest European civilization. Evidence from this and other sites indicates that the Cucuteni-Trypillian culture extracted salt from salt-laden spring water through the process of briquetage
2.
Bucharest
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Bucharest is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, at 44°25′57″N 26°06′14″E, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than 60 km north of the Danube River, Bucharest was first mentioned in documents in 1459. It became the capital of Romania in 1862 and is the centre of Romanian media, culture and its architecture is a mix of historical, interbellum, communist-era and modern. In the period between the two World Wars, the citys elegant architecture and the sophistication of its elite earned Bucharest the nickname of Little Paris. Although buildings and districts in the city centre were heavily damaged or destroyed by war, earthquakes. In recent years, the city has been experiencing an economic, in 2016, the historical city centre was listed as endangered by the World Monuments Watch. According to the 2011 census,1,883,425 inhabitants live within the city limits, the urban area extends beyond the limits of Bucharest proper and has a population of about 1.9 million people. Adding the satellite towns around the area, the proposed metropolitan area of Bucharest would have a population of 2.27 million people. According to Eurostat, Bucharest has an urban zone of 2,183,091 residents. According to unofficial data, the population is more than 3 million, Bucharest is the sixth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits, after London, Berlin, Madrid, Rome, and Paris. Economically, Bucharest is the most prosperous city in Romania and is one of the industrial centres. The city has big convention facilities, educational institutes, cultural venues, traditional shopping arcades, the Romanian name București has an uncertain origin. Tradition connects the founding of Bucharest with the name of Bucur, who was a prince, an outlaw, a fisherman, in Romanian, the word stem bucurie means joy, and it is believed to be of Dacian origin. Other etymologies are given by scholars, including the one of an Ottoman traveler, Evliya Çelebi. A native or resident of Bucharest is called a Bucharester, Bucharests history alternated periods of development and decline from the early settlements in antiquity until its consolidation as the national capital of Romania late in the 19th century. First mentioned as the Citadel of București in 1459, it became the residence of the famous Wallachian prince Vlad III the Impaler, the Ottomans appointed Greek administrators to run the town from the 18th century. A short-lived revolt initiated by Tudor Vladimirescu in 1821 led to the end of the rule of Constantinople Greeks in Bucharest, the Old Princely Court was erected by Mircea Ciobanul in the mid-16th century. Under subsequent rulers, Bucharest was established as the residence of the royal court
3.
Kingdom of Romania
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The Kingdom of Romania was a constitutional monarchy which existed between 13 March 1881 and 30 December 1947, specified by the first three Constitutions of Romania. As such, it is distinct from the Romanian Old Kingdom. From 1859 to 1877, Romania evolved from a union of two vassal principalities under a single prince to a full-fledged independent kingdom with a Hohenzollern monarchy. During 1918-20, at the end of World War I, Transylvania, Eastern Moldavia, in 1947 King Michael was compelled to abdicate and a socialist republic ruled by the Romanian Communist Party replaced the monarchy. The 1859 ascendancy of Alexandru Ioan Cuza as prince of both Moldavia and Wallachia under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire united an identifiably Romanian nation under a single ruler. On 5 February 1862 the two principalities were united to form the Principality of Romania, with Bucharest as its capital. On 23 February 1866 a so-called Monstrous coalition, composed of Conservatives and radical Liberals, the German prince Charles of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen was appointed as Prince of Romania, in a move to assure German backing to unity and future independence. He immediately adopted the Romanian spelling of his name, Carol, on 15 March 1881, as an assertion of full sovereignty, the Romanian parliament raised the country to the status of a kingdom, and Carol was crowned as king on 10 May. Abstaining from the Initial Balkan War against the Ottoman Empire, the Kingdom of Romania entered the Second Balkan War in June 1913 against the Tsardom of Bulgaria,330,000 Romanian troops moved across the Danube and into Bulgaria. One army occupied Southern Dobrudja and another moved into northern Bulgaria to threaten Sofia, Romania thus acquired the ethnically-mixed territory of Southern Dobrudja, which it had desired for years. In 1916 Romania entered World War I on the Entente side, the term came into use after World War I, when the Old Kingdom was opposed to Greater Romania, which included Transylvania, Banat, Bessarabia, and Bukovina. Nowadays, the term mainly has a historical relevance, and is used as a common term for all regions in Romania included in both the Old Kingdom and present-day borders. Romania delayed in entering World War I, but ultimately declared war on the Central Powers in 1916, War with the Hungarian Soviet Republic in 1919 resulted in the occupation of Budapest by Romanian troops and the end of Béla Kuns Bolshevik regime. At the Paris Peace Conference, Romania received territories of Transylvania, part of Banat, Bessarabia, thus, Romania in 1920 was more than twice the size it had been in 1914. Although the country was satisfied and had no territorial claims, it aroused the enmity of Bulgaria, and especially Hungary. Greater Romania now encompassed a significant minority population, especially of Hungarians, by contrast, the prewar Romanian state had only one real minority, Jews, but nonetheless anti-Semitism was widespread. Transylvania had significant Hungarian and German population, and with a contemptuous attitude towards Romanians. Both groups were excluded from politics as the postwar Romanian regime passed an edict stating that all personnel employed by the state had to speak Romanian
4.
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
5.
French Open
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The French Open, often referred to as Roland Garros, is a major tennis tournament held over two weeks between late May and early June at the Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France. Roland Garros is the only Grand Slam event held on clay, French spelling rules dictate that in the name of a place or event named after a person, the elements of the name are joined together with a hyphen. Therefore, the names of the stadium and the tournament are hyphenated as Roland-Garros, in 1891 the Championnat de France, which is commonly referred to in English as the French Championships, was begun. It was only open to players who were members of French clubs. The first winner was a Briton—H, the first womens singles tournament, with four entries, was held in 1897. The mixed doubles event was added in 1902 and the doubles in 1907. This French club members only tournament was played until 1924, using four different venues during that period, Île de Puteaux, in Puteaux, the Racing Club de France, played on clay. For one year,1909, it was played at the Société Athlétique de la Villa Primrose in Bordeaux, Tennis Club de Paris, at Auteuil, Paris, played on clay. Another tournament, the World Hard Court Championships, is considered the precursor to the French Open as it was open to international competitors. Winners of this tournament included world no, 1s such as Tony Wilding from New Zealand and Bill Tilden from the US. In 1924 there was no World Hard Court Championships due to tennis being played at the Paris Olympic Games, in 1925, the French Championships became open to all amateurs internationally and was designated a major championship by the ILTF. It was held at the Stade Français in Saint-Cloud in 1925 and 1927, in 1926 the Racing Club de France hosted the event in Paris, site of the previous French club members only Championship, also on clay. In 1928, the Roland Garros stadium was opened and the event has held there ever since. After the Mousquetaires or Philadelphia Four won the Davis Cup on American soil in 1927, the Stade de France had offered the tennis authorities three hectares of land with the condition that the new stadium must be named after the World War I pilot, Roland Garros. The new Stade de Roland Garros, and its Center Court hosted that Davis Cup challenge, during World War II the tournament was held from 1941 through 1945 on the same grounds but these editions are not recognized by the French governing body, Fédération Française de Tennis. From 1946 through 1947, the French Championships were held after Wimbledon, in 1968, the French Championships became the first Grand Slam tournament to go open, allowing both amateurs and professionals to compete. Since 1981, new prizes have been presented, the Prix Orange, the Prix Citron, in another novelty, since 2006 the tournament has begun on a Sunday, featuring 12 singles matches played on the three main courts. Additionally, on the eve of the opening, the traditional Benny Berthet exhibition day takes place
6.
The Championships, Wimbledon
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The Championships, Wimbledon, commonly known simply as Wimbledon, is the oldest tennis tournament in the world, and is widely considered the most prestigious. It has been held at the All England Club in Wimbledon, London, Wimbledon is one of the four Grand Slam tennis tournaments, the others being the Australian Open, the French Open and the US Open. Since the Australian Open shifted to hardcourt in 1988, Wimbledon is the only major still played on grass. The tournament takes place two weeks in late June and early July, culminating with the Ladies and Gentlemens Singles Final. Five major, junior, and invitational events are each year. Wimbledon traditions include a dress code for competitors and Royal patronage. The tournament is notable for the absence of sponsor advertising around the courts. In 2009, Wimbledons Centre Court was fitted with a roof to lessen the loss of playing time due to rain. The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club is a club founded on 23 July 1868. Its first ground was off Worple Road, Wimbledon, in 1876, lawn tennis, a game devised by Major Walter Clopton Wingfield a year or so earlier and originally given the name Sphairistikè, was added to the activities of the club. In spring 1877, the club was renamed The All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club, a new code of laws, replacing the code administered by the Marylebone Cricket Club, was drawn up for the event. Todays rules are similar except for such as the height of the net and posts. The inaugural 1877 Wimbledon Championship started on 9 July 1877 and the Gentlemens Singles was the event held. It was won by Spencer Gore, an old Harrovian rackets player, about 200 spectators paid one shilling each to watch the final. The lawns at the ground were arranged so that the court was in the middle with the others arranged around it. The name was retained when the Club moved in 1922 to the present site in Church Road, however, in 1980 four new courts were brought into commission on the north side of the ground, which meant the Centre Court was once more correctly defined. The opening of the new No.1 Court in 1997 emphasised the description, by 1882, activity at the club was almost exclusively confined to lawn tennis and that year the word croquet was dropped from the title. However, for reasons it was restored in 1899
7.
US Open (tennis)
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The United States Open Tennis Championships is a hardcourt tennis tournament. The tournament is the version of one of the oldest tennis championships in the world. The US Open is held annually, starting on the last Monday in August, the main tournament consists of five event championships, mens and womens singles, mens and womens doubles, and mixed doubles, with additional tournaments for senior, junior, and wheelchair players. Since 1978, the tournament has played on acrylic hard courts at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows–Corona Park, Queens. The US Open is owned and organized by the United States Tennis Association, net proceeds from ticket sales, sponsorships, and television deals are used to promote the development of tennis in the United States. The US Open is the only Grand Slam that employs tiebreakers in every set of a match, the first edition was won by Richard Sears, who went on to win seven consecutive singles titles. In the first years of the U. S. National Championship only men competed and this was followed by the introduction of the U. S. Womens National Doubles Championship in 1899 and the U. S. The womens tournament used a system from 1888 through 1918. This view was opposed by another group of players which included eight former national singles champions, the contentious issue was brought to a vote at the annual USNLTA meeting on February 5,1915 and with 128 votes in favor and 119 against it was decided to relocate. From 1921 through 1923, the tournament was played at the Germantown Cricket Club in Philadelphia and it returned to Forest Hills in 1924 following the completion of the newly constructed 14,000 seat concrete Forest Hills Stadium. Though regarded unofficially by many as a major championship beforehand, the tournament was officially designated as one of the tournaments by the ILTF commencing in 1924. At the 1922 U. S. National Championships the draw for the first time included seeded players in order to avoid leading players drawing against each other in the early rounds. Open era The open era began in 1968 when all five events were merged into the US Open, the 1968 combined tournament was open to professionals for the first time. That year,96 men and 63 women entered the event, from 1970 to 1974 the US Open used a best-of-nine point, sudden death tiebreaker before moving to the ITF best-of-twelve point system. In 1973 the US Open became the first Grand Slam tournament to award equal prize money to men and women with that years singles champions John Newcombe, another US Open innovation came in 1975 when floodlights enabled night play for the first time. In 1978 the tournament moved from the West Side Tennis Club, Forest Hills, Queens to the larger USTA National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows, Queens, three miles to the north. In the process, the tournament switched the court surface from clay, jimmy Connors is the only individual to have won US Open singles titles on all three surfaces, while Chris Evert is the only woman to win on two surfaces. The US Open is the only Grand Slam tournament that has played every year since its inception
8.
Tennis
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Tennis is a racket sport that can be played individually against a single opponent or between two teams of two players each. Each player uses a racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball covered with felt over or around a net. The object of the game is to play the ball in such a way that the opponent is not able to play a valid return, the player who is unable to return the ball will not gain a point, while the opposite player will. Tennis is an Olympic sport and is played at all levels of society, the sport can be played by anyone who can hold a racket, including wheelchair users. The modern game of tennis originated in Birmingham, England, in the late 19th century as lawn tennis and it had close connections both to various field games such as croquet and bowls as well as to the older racket sport of real tennis. The rules of tennis have changed little since the 1890s, two exceptions are that from 1908 to 1961 the server had to keep one foot on the ground at all times, and the adoption of the tiebreak in the 1970s. Tennis is played by millions of players and is also a popular worldwide spectator sport. Historians believe that the ancient origin lay in 12th century northern France. Louis X of France was a player of jeu de paume, which evolved into real tennis. Louis was unhappy with playing tennis outdoors and accordingly had indoor, in due course this design spread across royal palaces all over Europe. Because of the accounts of his death, Louis X is historys first tennis player known by name. Another of the enthusiasts of the game was King Charles V of France. It wasnt until the 16th century that rackets came into use, and the game began to be called tennis, from the French term tenez, an interjection used as a call from the server to his opponent. It was popular in England and France, although the game was played indoors where the ball could be hit off the wall. Henry VIII of England was a big fan of this game, during the 18th century and early 19th century, as real tennis declined, new racket sports emerged in England. This in turn led to the codification of rules for many sports, including lawn tennis, most football codes, lawn bowls. In 1872, along with two doctors, they founded the worlds first tennis club in Leamington Spa. Evans, turfgrass agronomist, Sports historians all agree that deserves much of the credit for the development of modern tennis, according to Honor Godfrey, museum curator at Wimbledon, Wingfield popularized this game enormously
9.
Universiade
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The Universiade is an international multi-sport event, organized for university athletes by the International University Sports Federation. The name is a combination of the words University and olympiad, the Universiade is often referred to in English as the World University Games or World Student Games, however, this latter term can also refer to competitions for sub-University grades students. The Universiade is the largest multi-sport event in the world apart from the Olympic Games, the most recent games were in 2017, the Winter Universiade was in Almaty, Kazakhstan, while the 2015 Summer Universiade was in Gwangju, Korea. The idea of an international sports competition between student-athletes pre-dates the 1949 formation of the International University Sports Federation, which now hosts the Universiade. This did not come to pass, but an event was created in Germany in 1909 in the form of the Academic Olympia. Five editions were held from 1909 to 1913, all of which were hosted in Germany following the cancellation of an Italy-based event, at the start of the 20th century, Jean Petitjean of France began attempting to organise a University Olympic Games. After discussion with Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympic Games, Petitjean, and later the Confederation Internationale des Etudiants, was the first to build a series of international events, beginning with the 1923 International Universities Championships. This was followed by the renamed 1924 Summer Student World Championships a year later, another name change resulted in the 1930 International University Games. The CIEs International University Games was held four times in the 1930s before having its final edition in 1947. A separate group organised an alternative university games in 1939 in Vienna, the onset of World War II ceased all major international student sport activities and the aftermath also led to division among the movement, as the CIE was disbanded and rival organisations emerged. The Union Internationale des Étudiants incorporated a university sports games into the World Festival of Youth and Students from 1947–1962, including one separate and this event principally catered for Eastern European countries. The Sports Week was held biennially until 1955, like the CIEs games before it, the FISU events were initially Western-led sports competitions. Division between the largely Western European FISU and Eastern European UIE eventually began to dissipate among broadened participation at the 1957 World University Games. This event was not directly organised by either group, instead being organised by Jean Petitjean in France, the FISU-organised Universiade became the direct successor to this competition, maintaining the biennial format into the inaugural 1959 Universiade. It was not until the 1957 World University Games that the Soviet Union began to compete in FISU events. That same year, what had previously been a European competition became a global one, with the inclusion of Brazil, Japan. The increased participation ultimately led to the establishment of the Universiade as the global student sport championship. Official website of the International University Sports Federation Official website of the German University Sports Federation Official report of the Winter Universiade Innsbruck / Seefeld 2005
10.
Ice hockey
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Ice hockey is a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a vulcanized rubber puck into their opponents net to score points. Ice hockey teams usually consist of six each, one goaltender. A fast-paced, physical sport, ice hockey is most popular in areas of North America, Ice hockey is the official national winter sport of Canada, where the game enjoys immense popularity. In North America, the National Hockey League is the highest level for mens hockey, the Kontinental Hockey League is the highest league in Russia and much of Eastern Europe. The International Ice Hockey Federation is the governing body for international ice hockey. The IIHF manages international tournaments and maintains the IIHF World Ranking, worldwide, there are ice hockey federations in 74 countries. Ice hockey is believed to have evolved from simple stick and ball games played in the 18th and 19th century United Kingdom and these games were brought to North America and several similar winter games using informal rules were developed, such as shinny and ice polo. The contemporary sport of ice hockey was developed in Canada, most notably in Montreal, some characteristics of that game, such as the length of the ice rink and the use of a puck, have been retained to this day. Amateur ice hockey began in the 1880s, and professional ice hockey originated around 1900. The Stanley Cup, emblematic of ice hockey club supremacy, was first awarded in 1893 to recognize the Canadian amateur champion, in international competitions, the national teams of six countries predominate, Canada, Czech Republic, Finland, Russia, Sweden and the United States. Of the 69 medals awarded all-time in mens competition at the Olympics, in the annual Ice Hockey World Championships,177 of 201 medals have been awarded to the six nations. In Russia and the Ukraine, where hockey can also refer to bandy, the name hockey has no clear origin. The English historian and biographer John Strype did not use the word hockey when he translated the proclamation in 1720, the 1573 Statute of Galway banned a sport called hokie—the hurling of a little ball with sticks or staves. A form of this word was thus being used in the 16th century, though much removed from its current usage. According to the Austin Hockey Association, the word derives from the Scots Gaelic puc or the Irish poc. The blow given by a hurler to the ball with his caman or hurley is always called a puck. Stick-and-ball games date back to pre-Christian times, in Europe, these games included the Irish game of hurling, the closely related Scottish game of shinty and versions of field hockey. IJscolf, a game resembling colf on a surface, was popular in the Low Countries between the Middle Ages and the Dutch Golden Age. It was played with a curved bat, a wooden or leather ball
11.
Boris Becker
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Boris Franz Becker is a German former world No.1 professional tennis player. He is a major singles champion, including, having been the youngest Wimbledon mens champion when he was 17. He has won 3 Wimbledon titles and he also won 13 Masters Series titles, five elite indoor titles. He is the player to have won all 3 Open era season end finals ATP Tour Finals, WCT Finals. Becker also won Olympic gold medal in doubles, Tennis magazine ranked Becker the 11th best male player of the period 1965–2005. He also coached Novak Djokovic for three years beginning in 2013, Boris Becker was born in Leimen, Germany, the only son of Elvira and Karl-Heinz Becker. His mother was Catholic, and they raised him as a Catholic and his father Karl-Heinz, an architect, founded a tennis centre in Leimen, where Becker learned the game. Becker turned professional in 1984, under the guidance of Romanian-born coach Günther Bosch and Romanian manager Ion Ţiriac, and won his first professional doubles title that year in Munich. As a German teenager, Becker won the Tennis World Young Masters at the NEC in Birmingham in 1985, two weeks later, on 7 July, he became the first unseeded player and the first German to win the Wimbledon singles title, defeating Kevin Curren in four sets. Becker was at that time ranked 20th in ATP ranking, and was unseeded and he was the youngest ever male Grand Slam singles champion at 17 years,227 days. Two months after his triumph, Becker became the youngest winner of the Cincinnati Open, Becker has since said that The plan from my parents for me was to finish school, go to university, get a proper degree and learn something respectful. The last thing on everyones mind was me becoming a tennis professional, in 1986, Becker successfully defended his Wimbledon title, defeating world no.1 Ivan Lendl in straight sets in the final. In 1987 Becker, then ranked world no,2, was upset in the second round of Wimbledon by the world no.70 player, Peter Doohan. In the Davis Cup that year, Becker and John McEnroe played one of the longest matches in tennis history, Becker won 4–6, 15–13, 8–10, 6–2, 6–2. The match lasted 6 hours and 22 minutes, Becker was back in the Wimbledon final in 1988, where he lost in four sets to Stefan Edberg in a match that marked the start of one of Wimbledons great rivalries. Becker also helped West Germany win its first Davis Cup in 1988 and he won the year-end Masters title in New York City, defeating five-time champion Lendl in the final. The same year he won season ending WCT Finals for the rival World Championship Tennis tour. In 1989, Becker won two Grand Slam singles titles, the year he won more than one
12.
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
Romania
Ilie Năstase
Dennis Ralston
Nikola Pilić
William Bowrey 
Bob Hewitt 
Thomaz Koch
Tom Okker 
Roger Taylor
Georges Goven 
Andrés Gimeno 
Jan Kodeš
Juan Gisbert
Patrick Hombergen 
Adriano Panatta
Hans-Jürgen Pohmann 
Ove Nils Bengtson
Guillermo Vilas
Wojciech Fibak
Anand Amritraj 
