Wednesday, August 01, 2012

Tennis in the Olympics and Marc Rosset 1992 Barcelona

It's that time again. Where once every 4 years for 2 weeks the worlds biggest sporting carnival dominates the global sporting landscape. There is the explosion of instant experts in sports where these people have never seen before, the most recent example the amount of British cycling experts after Brad "Sideboards" Wiggins win the Tour de France.

Whether tennis deserves to be in the Olympics is a debatable, though there are many sports in the Games that are of questionable merit. In theory an Olympic gold medal should be the pinnacle of their chosen sport, this is definitely not the case in tennis where the Grand Slams take precedence. Golf which is coming into the Rio games has their majors this won't change. Football which has only been out of two Olympiads know that Olympic gold won't match the World Cup, or major continental championships. They have settled on Under 23s with three overage players which has worked effectively since they decided to officially open the games to professional athletes in 1992.


Mecir Gold in Seoul 88

Returning to the Olympics

Tennis came back into the 1984 LA games as a demonstration event. In Seoul it became a proper event won by the unique and languid Slovak Miloslav Mecir, who was representing Czechoslovakia at that time. With the corporatisation of the Olympics professional athletes were allowed to compete in 1992 Barcelona. The notion of amateurism in the top sports was flawed in the former Communist countries they had nominal jobs but were professional athletes. The brown envelopes with guarantees were always paid to the top stars in their chosen sports.

Prestige is a concept like many is interpreted in different ways. One to suit a particular viewpoint and the other within tennis is environmental. An example of the former is when Rafael Nadal won gold in Beijing therefore the Olympic gold is somehow more prestigious than when Nicolas Massu in 2004 who is the only man to win the singles and doubles. Kafelnikov in 2000 or Marc Rosset in Barcelona, the upcoming subject of this article. The latter is the arrogant notion that every single tennis player that ever lived or won a Slam would trade their titles for one at Wimbledon.


Massu and Gonzalez Chilean gold medalists

Roger Federer hasn't won an Olympic gold medal in singles and would love to do so at Wimbledon his favourite place besides Basel. He said "it would be a “dream come true, because I definitely get inspired by the 1992 victory" and nominates Rosset as his Olympic hero.

Barcelona 1992

Marc Rosset came into the Barcelona Olympics ranked 44 having won two career titles one in his hometown of Geneva in 1999 on the clay, the other in Lyon 2000 on carpet. There were no indicators that he was among the major medal contenders. Rosset was happy to be there at the Games, he stayed in the Olympic village as did his good friend Goran Ivanisevic which is unusual for the higher ranked tennis players who are used to more salubrious surroundings. “It was too bad the Swiss tennis federation could only come up with tickets to modern pentathlon and archery, and said that the beer wasn't cold enough in the athletes' village”. Rosset said

As an unseeded player Rosset didn’t benefit from an easy draw. In the 1st round he defeated Karim “The Dream” Alami the Moroccan with a lot of talent who later went on to defeat Sampras later in his career, who retired in the 3rd set. In the second round he smashed South African Wayne Ferreira ranked 13th for the loss of 6 games. Unlike the other Games which came after Barcelona the matches were best of 5 sets starting from the 1st round in both singles and doubles.

The Courier didn't deliver

It was in the 3rd round where Rosset really made his mark where he took apart world number 1 Jim Courier 6-4 6-2 6-1. Courier at the time was the fittest, strongest and most powerful player on the tour. He dominated Roland Garros in 1992 crushing good claycourt players like Thomas Muster, Andrei Medvedev, Alberto Mancini, then lost his only set in the tournament to Ivanisevic before thumping Agassi and Korda.

Rosset being 2m tall built his game on his huge powerful serve and forehand instead of trying to hit through Courier he outsmarted him on the clay. Courier was one of the first players just to camp in the backhand corner and thump off forehands. Apart from the usual Rosset tactics in the rallies, he was hitting slice backhands and changes of pace down the line to Courier’s forehand side keeping him off balance, so he couldn’t his favourite forehand from the backhand corner. The American was so frustrated, it got to the point where the very ugly side of Courier on court was rampant, cursing linesmen, then being the frustrated baseballer because Rosset threw him out of his rhythm and after the match Rosset accused Courier of tanking. Rosset’s tactics contributing to Courier acting like a baby and throwing his toys out of the pram.

Next up for the giant Swiss was Emilio Sanchez who grew up in Barcelona and a tough player on the clay. Sanchez didn’t have a big weapon and the slice backhand stayed very low which he used to get Rosset out of position. Rosset battling against the loud and vocal crowd, as well as a tough opponent got it done in 4 sets winning 11-9 in the tiebreaker.

In the semi finals big Rosset played his great friend Ivansievic, when asked what their matches are normally like. Goran answered “aces and double faults’. This particular case was different the lactic bear got Ivanisevic and mauled him to the ground, so it was an easy win for Rosset. Ivanisevic defeated Mota, Haarhuis, Hlasek and Santoro all in 5 sets in addition to playing 4 doubles matches losing the semi finals in 5 sets.

While Ivanisevic didn’t win the gold, he was very happy winning two bronze medals for Croatia. "Those people who are fighting there for freedom. It means a lot to them”. This was a true Herculean effort from Ivanisevic and remains along with his Wimbledon win one of his career highlights "It's very special to become the first Croatian to win a medal for all our people," Ivanisevic said, after defeating France's Fabrice Santoro in five hard-fought sets in a fierce midday sun. "When you play for your country, you really want to fight. I felt very motivated today."

Gold Medal Match

Jordi Arrese was Rosset’s opponent in the final he had a much easier route to the final, in spite of this he was battling an abdominal strain. There was some drama with his selection though Arrese was originally selected in the team. Carlos Costa who is now better known as the agent for Rafael Nadal and David Nalbandian went on a great run of form reaching the top 10 and they wanted to replace Arrese. Costa in a magnificent gesture refused to do take the position which would have left his friend Arrese out of the Games for which he had been preparing for all year.

No, the match wasn’t been two major stars but it was what the Olympics should be about. Two guys fighting very hard for their countries in pursuit of the gold medal. As this event was best of 5 throughout the tournament, even more significantly that unlike the tournament today there were no ranking points so players and fans knew which players truly wanted to play this event.

Rosset started well dominating with his serve and forehand taking the first two sets but Arrese was famous for his limitless endurance could say he was a running machine just getting every ball back. He stepped into the court and started moving the big man around in brutal conditions. Barcelona was hot, humid, the clay was very slow and once Arrese got the 3rd set the crowd were boisterous in trying to get Arrese over the line. There were signs "Endavant Jordi, Catalunya es amb tu," meaning "Go forward Jordi, Catalonia is with you"

Arrese had the momentum took the 4th set and Rosset thought about retiring from the match as he was exhausted, dehydrated and struggling to move "A couple of times I wanted to go to the locker room and drink a few Cokes." ."But when I was thinking of stopping, I knew everybody is going to kill me. You can't just quit because you are tired." Rosset said. The Catalan crowd were giving him a hard time not clapping the winners and cheering enthusiastically the double faults as much as Arrese’s winners.


Last 2 games of the match watch from 07:00 if no attention span

Two sets all and the fun started the main question could Arrese and 7000 screaming fans get him over the line or Rosset being able to resist the tough conditions and the crowd. Thankfully for Rosset it started to get cloudier and looking at his coach plus his 3 other fans in the stadium inspired him to keep going from 5-5 he didn’t lose a point on serve. At *6-7 with Arrese at 40-15, Rosset manages to get to deuce and then the mental battle was truly on. Since the video is uploaded, follow the links if the readers want to see the whole set. The two attached are the last two games and the ceremony, so the video can sum up the respective feelings better than most people could.

It’s easy to see why as a youngster Federer would be inspired by this surprising and brilliant gold medal from Rosset. He beat the world number 1 and reigning Roland Garros champion for the loss of 7 games, apart from Alami the others were ranked in the top 30. His victory wasn’t about the ranking points, just getting out there competing for the love of sport and representing your nation.


Victory ceremony


Rosset with the gold


Rosset winning an Olympic gold in tennis doesn’t mean it lacks prestige because he wasn’t a big star at the time, the same goes for Massu and Kafelnikov. Rosset has another take on it “OK, I’m Olympic champion, but as a tennis player, for me 20 years ago to win the 100 metres in track and field this is something for the Olympics but tennis it was maybe not in the mind of the tennis player in that it was not a priority in the way that it came to be with Agassi, with Nadal, with all those guys who said 'OK I want to get the Olympic medal' so it became something big for the tennis players right now. “The feeling was special because I was the only medal for the whole country; I was lucky in that way that I was the only one – it was a nice feeling when I came back home.”


Rosset comes back to Geneva

Thomas Muster who was an outstanding competitor especially for Austria has a different view. "It's the greatest thing for swimmers and track-and-field athletes: Muster said. "They've been working for years for a medal. But we have four Grand Slams and the Masters, and every week there is a goal. I don't think tennis should be there".

As for tennis being in the Olympics it probably shouldn’t be there, but there are more sports that deserve to be axed. Since it’s established now, the best option is to scrap ATP points awarded for the Games. It’s not like they can be defended next year or in 4 years on the Entry System. No, it’s not expected they stay in village or forgo financial payment in this case. The athletics stars don’t get points for their Diamond League series at the Olympics and the same principle should apply to tennis. Muster touches on one of the main problems of tennis at the Games. Ranking points shouldn’t be offered at Davis Cup level and especially not at the Olympics, but one can dream.

Who knows whether Massu, Mecir or Rosset would trade their Olympic gold medal for a Slam victory, the fact they are Olympic champions will never change and competing at the Games is an unique experience that can’t be measured in ranking points.