Who is Rod Laver and why did Roger Federer want to honour him?
It speaks volumes as to Roger Federer's character that he would do something like this.
ROD Laver (79) is the Australian tennis player after whom the newly formed Laver Cup has been named.
Laver’s main claim to fame is that he is the only player to have tennis’s Grand Slam in a calendar year. And he has done it twice!
Others have come close, like Mats Wilander, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic. They’ve all won three in a year, but never four.
Laver’s 200 singles titles are the most in history, and included 11 Slams.
It could have been many more, but as a professional, he was not permitted to enter these tournaments for a period of five years, before tennis finally became professional.
Laver, nicknamed ‘Rocket’, achieved the calendar-year Grand Slam in 1962 and 1969, and the latter remains the only time a man has done so in the Open Era.
He also won eight Pro Slam titles, including the “pro Grand Slam” in 1967, and he contributed to five Davis Cup titles for Australia during an age when Davis Cup was deemed as significant as the Grand Slams.
The recently completed Laver Cup, played in Prague between Europe and the ‘World, in a manner similar to golf’s Ryder Cup, was a tremendous success.
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It was Roger Federer’s idea – to honour the greats that have gone before and made tennis the successful sport it is today.
When one considers that Federer, who has won 19 Slams, is arguably the greatest ever, that’s quite something.
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