Little could have prepared Gabriela Sabatini and Andrea
Strnadova for their role of opening Centre Court act on
Middle Sunday at the 1991 Championships.
One of the wettest first weeks in the tournament's history
- just 52 out of approximately 240 matches were completed
by Thursday evening - prompted the decision to stage play
on the traditional day off to help get the tournament back
on schedule.
Sabatini and Strnadova emerged from their dressing room
into the arena for their third-round noon showdown. They
were greeted by a packed stadium, a seemingly unending roar
and enough Mexican waves to fill an ocean.
The carnival atmosphere for a first, early-round match
on the world's most famous tennis court was very different
to the norm. Sabatini and Strnadova might have expected
polite applause, the buzz of muted conversation in a stadium
half full with those who had foresaken luncheon, an umpire
banging his microphone while climbing into his chair and
John Barrett getting himself comfy in his BBC TV commentary
box.
Argentinian Sabatini blushed at the reception, her head
lowered and her eyes wide in coy, bemused reaction. Czech
Strndova smiled broadly. Second seed seed Sabatini claimed
the match on her way to the final but they both claimed
the hearts of the 11,000 joyous spectators.
Centre Court was rammed to the gills. The spectators had
raced from the gates for prime, unreserved seats. Once there,
they were not moving for fear of losing them. They had formed
part of a queue snaking almost two miles that produced an
attendance of 24,894.
John Parsons, the tennis correspondent of The Daily Telegraph,
said: "It was amazing how many people were there considering
the decision was only taken on the Friday evening to play
on the Sunday. It was the spontaneity of the whole thing.
I remember the rush, particularly for the front row seats
of the first tier of Centre Court. I'm sure if I hadn't
have guarded the press seats, they'd have gone as well."
It was more a football crowd, with the chanting and singing,
but there was no chance of the sunny good humour suffering
the dark, malevolent mood swing often associated with the
British national game.
At £10 a head for Centre Court and No.1 Courts tickets
and £5 for ground passes, one and all got more than
their money's worth.
No.1 Court gave a boisterous reception to Mary Joe Ferndanez
and Pam Shriver in the all-American opener. A finalist 12
months earlier, Zina Garrison, another American, en route
to the quarter-finals, and Swede Maria Strandlund provided
the prelude to the main event, John McEnroe, a legend in
his penultimate Wimbledon. McEnroe, a three-time champion,
did not disappoint his adoring fans with a victory against
Frenchman Jean-Philippe Fleurian.
A competitive, good natured doubles, in which Anders Jarryd
(Sweden) and John Fitzgerald (Australia) beat Wally Masur
and fellow Australian Jason Stoltenberg rounded things off.
With the exit of Ms Sabatini and Strnadova, victories for
eventual Swedish semi-finalist Stefan Edberg over Christo
Van Rensburg (South Africa) and Arantxa-Sanchez-Vicario
over Lori McNeil (USA), warmed up the effervescent crowd
on the main court for the top of the bill: Jimmy Connors.
Spectators cheered the American's every hit in his warm-up
with Derrick Rostagno. To stand there as the roaring reached
a crescendo was to feel one's eardrums about to burst. Connors,
ever the showman, was loving it, smiling broadly and acknowledging
the support.
There was no talk of whether the crowd was knowledgable,
polite, sportsmanlike; it was of the electricity generated
by the £10-a-headers that fizzed around arguably the
greatest arena in sport. Connors, eventually, got upstaged
by his fellow American, but the atmosphere overtook the
results that day.
It was, as chief executive Chris Gorringe said, an unrepeatable
experience. You really had to be there.
Michael Stich won his first and only Wimbledon singles
title that year, while Steffi Graf claimed the third of
seven. There was also the record-breaking mixed doubles
of 77 games which ended with Dutch pair Michiel Schapers
and Brenda Schultz defeating compatriot Tom Nijssen and
Hungarian Andrea Temesvari.
But the overriding memory of that year's Championships
was People's Day.
Just ask Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe and Gabriela Sabatini
who were the stars of Wimbledon 1991 and they would point
to the 24,894 spectators who had engulfed the grounds that
day.
Written by Mike Donovan
