La leyenda del tenis argentino (SPA-ENG)

Argentine tennis legend

I think I have said it on some other occasion, tennis does not attract my attention too much, it is somewhat strange in a person predisposed to watch (and sometimes practice) sports of all kinds. You already know that I like several sports that are rarely practiced here, such as baseball and American football for example, however, one of the most amateur sports in my country is tennis, but it doesn't appeal to me, I don't know. really the causes.

I don't deny it, when there is a very important match, such as the final of a Grand Slam or Davis Cup, I can watch it for a while, but that's it. At some point, my brain clicks and I say, enough for me, that's all I can see of this and I immediately change the channel.

I only looked at tennis with enthusiasm in a distant time, when Guillermo Vilas was playing, a great player who brought this sport to the forefront of attention in a country where it was not very widespread and even less practiced. Certainly, we owe it to Vilas that tennis is today one of the 5 most practiced sports in Argentina and many good players have come out after him and with total confidence, I say that we owe it to Vilas: Jose Luis Clerc, the enormous Gabriela Sabatini, Paola Suarez who very quietly (and ignored) in doubles has 8 Grand Slam titles, Gastón Gaudio, David Nalbaldian and Juan Martín del Potro who probably would have won much more if it weren't for a series of injuries that kept him from that possibility.

I remember the time when Vilas played, he competed with an enormous amount of talent, I surely believe that there were more players of extraordinary quality that divided the tournaments among themselves in that time than in the recent ones of Nadal, Federer, and Djokovic. I remember McEnroe, Borg, Connors and Iván Lendl, the most outstanding, all multiple Grand Slam winners like our Guillermo Vilas who won four and held the record for the most consecutive matches won on dust for many years. of brick, beaten earth, or clay as they say in other places. If I remember correctly there were 53 and we had to wait more than 40 years for an absolute monster like Nadal to come along to break that mark, as I once said, records are there to be broken, even if it takes almost half a century.

Vilas won 63 tournaments on the ATP circuit, for this and for his exemplary behavior on and off the courts he is greatly respected in the most prestigious circles of world tennis, he was great among many greats in a time that is unlikely to be repeated, as At least today there is no glimpse of a golden age like that or like the one that has just culminated with the retirement of Federer and the injuries that have kept Nadal away, probably forever.

Today Guillermo Vilas suffers from a cruel illness, and lives in seclusion in Monaco accompanied by his family made up of his wife and four children who he knew how to build and preserve from that fame that often destroys them, recently a note made to his eldest daughter Andanin, 20 years, brought us a bit of the memory and nostalgia of that great player who, based on practice and sacrifice, was able to earn a prominent place within that litter of notables.

My memory and gratitude go to that enormous player who knew how to install in the country the taste and passion for a sport that in those years was practiced only by a minority. He was the only one who convinced me, at least for a while, that the tennis I didn't see could be exciting and magical, he was while Guillermo Vilas practiced it.

In that report, Andanin Vilas said that his father likes to think that people remember him, how can we not remember someone who has left such a deep mark on our lives?