Gabriela Sabatini
Gabriela Beatriz Sabatini was born in 1970 in Argentina. She was only 11 when she won Junior Championship, which was held in Caracas. However, this wasn’t her first important victory as she had already impressed tennis critics with her victories in metropolitan and National tournaments.
She also won Garros Roland at the age of 14 and became world number 1 in junior rankings. She entered the Grand Slam race in 1988 but only managed a Silver medal.
However, she made her come back the next year to win a Grand Slam title. She was coached by famous Carlos Kirmayr that year. Unfortunately, it proved to be her only Grand Slam title.
She won her second Masters’s in 1994. The next year proved to be her last title-winning year as she beat Lindsay. She played her farewell tournament in Zurich. She was given a farewell party at famous Madison Square, New York. Overall, Gabriela Sabatini clinched 27 titles in her career.
She also made semi-finals in the Australian Open three times in her career. She also reached the semi-finals three consecutive times in US Open. Due to her achievements, she is remembered as one of the most popular players of her time in the game. She is also considered one of the most charming players in the game’s history, the reason a species of rose was named after her.
Hana Mandlikova
Of Czech origin, Hana Mandlikova is an adept tennis player who dominated the tennis arena with her articulate skills and beautiful display of strokes throughout the 1980s.
Having represented two countries, first her native country Czechoslovakia and later on Australia, Hana Mandlikova is certainly a renowned name in the galore of tennis and is remembered and hauled by many for the beauty with which she would display her skills at the game of tennis.
She is proudly acclaimed as the victor of four Grand Slams, namely two Australian Opens and one Us Open and French Open each. Such an accomplishment is one of the many other reasons why she is remembered as an exceptionally talented tennis player even two decades after her retirement.
While she emerged successfully and was hailed victor at four Grand Slams, she nonetheless managed to reach the finals four more times, at all of which she was declared a runner-up.
Other than that, Hana Mandlikova also has to her name the honor of being crowned victorious at the US Open doubles in 1989, a feat she accomplished in partnership with her accomplice Martina Navratilova.
Injuries affected much of the latter part of the career of Hana Mandlikova, forcing her to retire at a surprisingly early age of 28. Had her career not fallen prey to this menace, the world of tennis would surely have gotten to see much more from this legend and would have had a lot more accolades to associate her name with for sure.
