When we were kings
Recalling the day Pat Cash crushed Ivan the Terrible
It is part of every Wimbledon highlight film. Thirty years ago, Pat Cash, sporting a black-andwhite chequered headband that would never be sanctioned today, punched an angled volley into the open court and then celebrated his first grand-slam title with an unscheduled ascent towards his friends and family in the player’s box above the scoreboard.
But what of the man left resolutely earthbound at that moment? What about Ivan Lendl, who found himself staring forlornly into space as the festivities proceeded on the other side of the court?
Perhaps Lendl was never a crowd favourite at Wimbledon, where his blank-faced demeanour and stiltlegged groundstrokes seemed out of place amid all those muscular servevolleyers. This was the Boris Becker era, after all.
But Lendl was a big part of the story of the Championships for a decade, winning 48 matches – only three fewer than Bjorn Borg – and reaching the final twice. On the roll call of the biggest names never to lift the title, he stands on a par with Ken “Muscles” Rosewall and the saturnine force of nature that was Ilie Nastase.
It might seem ironic now that Lendl skipped the tournament in 1982, citing a respiratory allergy to grass. He had a great desire for completeness – one of his idols is Northrup R Knox, a champion at real tennis who retired undefeated – and by 1989 he was missing only one significant title from his collection. A year later, a waspish Wimbledon preview in The Guardian reported that “Obsession by Ivan Lendl is rivalling The Mousetrap as a long runner”.
In Peter Bodo’s book Courts of Babylon, the author described a 1991 tour of Lendl’s gigantic Georgian mansion in Greenwich, Connecticut. “The only trophies on display were replicas of the ones handed out by the Grand Slam tournaments,” Bodo wrote, before reporting Lendl’s own wistful comment, delivered in that precise Czech accent. “It would be nice to have one from Vimbledon. The balance would be perfect, but what can I do?”
Bodo’s interview dates from a time when the wound was still fresh. Lendl was still skipping clay-court tournaments – including the French Open in both 1990 and 1991– to give himself extra preparation time on the green stuff. Today, after almost a quarter-century of retirement, Lendl sounds rather more phlegmatic about the one that got away.
“People really do think I don’t sleep at night because I didn’t win Wimbledon,” he says now. “Well, it’s true that I didn’t sleep well at night for a while – but that was because my hips needed replacement. I am pain-free since I have the new ones. And as for Wimbledon, I am proud of my record. I did everything I could.
“In some ways I feel that my record there was actually better than at the other slams, given the people I was up against – Boris Becker, John McEnroe, Stefan Edberg, Pat Cash – and the cards I had to play with.
“The more time I spent on grass, the more natural it was for me. I would have loved the extra week that has now been added to the grass-court swing after the French Open, because I remember playing the finals at Roland Garros and being at Queen’s for a match 25 hours later. You just hoped it would rain on Monday to give you a chance to adjust. There were guys who had already been there for a couple of weeks practising. But it was different times.”
In 1987, Lendl came in as the second seed, and his odds shortened dramatically when top seed Becker – the man who had beaten him in the previous year’s final – lost to Peter Doohan in the second round. It was one of the great upsets in the annals of Wimbledon, giving rise to Becker’s famous press-conference comment: “I lost a tennis match. Nobody died.”
From Lendl’s perspective, however, little had changed. “It was still so early in the tournament,” he recalls, “and you can only control your own part of the draw. It was similar to last year when Novak [Djokovic] went out in the third round. Everyone was talking about how Andy [Murray] would react, and he did go on to win the title, but we didn’t know that then. You can only focus on yourself.”
The first week of the tournament found Cash dropping just a single set while Lendl had to burn extra energy in long tussles with Christian Saceanu, Paolo Canè and Richey Reneburg. But he was still in good enough shape to oust Edberg in the semi-final – a result he describes as his best win at Wimbledon. “Stefan was always tough for me to play, and that day he was giving me trouble by chipping and charging against my second serve,” Lendl remembers.
“He was putting his volley against my volley, because I always served and volleyed on grass, and it seemed to be working well for him. But then he just stopped doing it. I never worked out why. I got the better of the third-set tiebreak and finished it in four.
“It was a good win because Stefan liked to play at Wimbledon so much. The bounce was lower there, whereas at Queen’s it came through higher so I found it easier to hit strong returns.”
Having dispatched one classic net-jockey in the semi-final, Lendl found himself facing another on the second Sunday. Cash was then 22 and at the height of his powers. He also resented Lendl’s alpha-male behaviour in the locker room. His autobiography claims that Lendl once deliberately ripped up a pair of customised shoes, given to Cash by his outfitter Diadora, as a practical joke. While Lendl denies this, there is no doubt that tension existed. “If I had lost to Lendl in the Wimbledon final, it would have been painful,” said Cash recently. “That would have really upset me.”
The day dawned sunny and hot – conditions that would send the balls flying through a split-second faster and thus support Cash’s more aggressive style. He established his credentials early, bringing up five break points in the second game of the match. Even though Lendl saved the lot, he was already sensing a hard road ahead. “Cash was great at covering the net,” Lendl recalls now. “I had a really hard time passing him. He placed his volleys well, stayed smart tactically.
“He played a fantastic final. This was his best moment. Tony [Roche, Lendl’s coach] and I talked about the match afterwards, and we didn’t think I could have done anything differently.”
And how about that lengthy interval while Cash climbed up to the balcony like Romeo in Verona? An interval that Lendl spent drinking water and retying his shoelaces? “I was just disappointed afterwards. Would I have liked to win Wimbledon? I would have liked to win 25 more slams. But on that day, it just wasn’t to be.”
‘I am proud of my record there. Would I like to have won it? I would like to have won 25 more slams’