Roland Garros

Tennis legends who are still courtside

by Paul Myers

Article published on the 2008-05-31 Latest update 2008-05-31 16:00 TU

Not fading yet - Russia's Maria Sharapova serves to Italy's Karin Knapp
(Photo: Reuters)

As the popular barracks ballad of yore goes: 'old soldiers never die; they just fade away.'

And what of old tennis players? They just commentate away.

Walking around the Roland Garros complex, it’s like a 'who was who' of the world game.

A few years back, I saw the Swiss star Martina Hingis with a TV crew in her wake. Then she came out of retirement and it all ended in a drugs row.

I’ve seen the German former Wimbledon champion Michael Stich doing his media thing here. John McEnroe has been a regular over the past five years. He dons a baseball cap presumably to stop unwanted approaches from fans.

I play it cool in the commentary studios atop Court Suzanne Lenglen. I’ve never gone and asked for his autograph. What I really want is tips on how to serve.

One former star was out and about in the stadium complex on Saturday: Ilie Nasatase, who won Roland Garros back in 1973, was outside the Tenniseum signing copies of his autobiography Monsieur Nastase.

A picture of him in his prime isn’t that different from the man as he is now at the age of 61. His locks are still long and flowing, though speckled with grey, and he still has the twinkle in his eye which could provoke and charm in equal measure.

Looking dapper in a dark blue suit and an open-necked mauve and white-striped shirt, Nastase posed for pictures with adults and signed the oversized Roland Garros tennis balls for the children.

I had my picture taken with Martina Navratilova. I was doing some last-minute editing for a broadcast just outside the studio, and Damien, the studio producer, thought it would make a good shot: me looking concentrated on all fours slicing up some fine sound from one of the players.

As I was “in the zone” - a phrase the commentators like to use for being focused - I felt a presence behind me. Then this face bent down to ask me what I was doing.

I looked round and it was Martina Navratilova, winner of 40 billion singles, doubles and mixed doubles titles!

Pressed as I was to get my piece ready for the impending broadcast, I thought I should devote a few seconds to a woman I used to watch on TV at Wimbledon when I was a kid in London.

As I saw the flash of the studio producer’s digital camera, I explained how things worked. And she remarked: “I’ve never seen anything like that before.”

And she ambled off to her studio.

“Did you get me with Martina?” I asked Damien.

“Who?” he replied.

“Martina Navratilova….tennis legend??”

Of course not. He was more interested in capturing me in the zone, rather than me with someone who’d lived it on a tennis court. We looked at the pictures on the camera and sure enough there are a few shots of me in full working mode.

And on one picture just beside me, prodding in from the edge, are two feet in white training shoes.

And that, for me, will do.