Triumph for the Old Man

It was just as if Willie Mays had hit two game-winning home runs off Mickey Lolich in the World Series. Or George Blanda had outplayed Roger Staubach in back-to-back Super Bowls. Or Sammy Snead had beaten Jack Nicklaus in successive play-offs for the Masters. Last week, at 37, for the second year in a row, Ken Rosewall won the world championship of professional tennis. Once again, he did it by defeating the most formidable opponent possible, Rod ("The Rocket") Laver.

The match, held in Dallas, was more than a personal and profitable triumph for the "old man" of the professional tennis circuit; it was a vicarious victory for all middle-aged athletes who are over the hill or who never even got to the crest. Rosewall (who is nicknamed "Muscles" because of his slight build) won the $50,000 first prize by refusing to sag in a match that was wearing on both body and mind. The five sets lasted for a stamina-sapping three hours and 37 minutes, and the last two sets were decided by the nerve-jangling tiebreaker scoring system. Final score: 4-6, 6-0, 6-3, 6-7, 7-6.

The marathon was a particular triumph for tennis, which is one of the fastest-growing U.S. sports but has had relatively little exposure on national television. This time, however, a nationwide audience tuned in to the NBC-TV network saw one of the most dramatic and well-played matches in tennis history. Searching for a comparison, one columnist reached back to Don Budge-Baron von Cramm at Wimbledon before World War II.

Budge owed much of his victory in that match to a backhand that was considered the best ever until Rosewall came along. Hit by Rosewall with a gracefulness that belies its guile and power, the stroke undid Laver in the closing exchanges of the last set. Throughout the match, Rosewall also employed two other great assets: a crisp and deftly angled volley, and an anticipation that turned some Laver bullets into boomerangs.

Rosewall has been playing the same sort of stylish tennis since the '50s, when he and another Australian teenager, Lew Hoad, were beating U.S. Davis Cup teams manned by Vic Seixas and Tony Trabert. It has helped him win major titles over an incredible span: the U.S. championship in 1956 and again in 1970; the French championship in 1953 and 1968; the Australian championship four times, the first in 1953 and the most recent just this year.

Muscles and Energy. Few athletes in any sport have aged as imperceptibly as Rosewall, either in performance or appearance. Slightly under 5 ft. 7 in. tall, he has held his weight around 140 Ibs. for most of his playing career. His apparent signs of fatigue between points --hanging his head, then lifting it again with a visible sigh--have long been a Rosewall trademark. Actually, like former Cleveland Fullback Jimmy Brown, Muscles saves his energy for the moments when the ball is in play.

Rosewall is careful not to live it up. Despite his Aussie heritage, he drinks less beer than even some of the American players. While traveling, he writes four letters a week to his wife and two sons in Sydney. Back home for a rest after his Dallas triumph, Rosewall counted his earnings so far this year ($104,750) and pondered his future. He plans to take another crack next year at the only major title that has eluded him, Wimbledon. By then he will be 38, six years older than Jaroslav Drobny was in 1954 when he scraped by a 19-year-old prodigy to win Wimbledon. The name of the prodigy: Ken Rosewall.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.