I became a tennis fan in the early nineties. This was when, in my opinion, some of the best male and female tennis players existed; Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi, Steffi Graf, Goran Ivanisevic and Monica Seles. After the subsequent retirement of all of these great champions, I’m sad to say I lost my interest a bit in the sport. That is why I was so thrilled to attend the 2011 Champions Series at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia on September 24.
The Champions Series is a mini-tournament for retired professionals. There are eight tennis players who compete in a 12-city tour. They play two semifinal matches and one final match in order to accumulate points. The top three players at the end of the tournament split $1,000,000. In Philadelphia, the first semifinal was played by Agassi and Jim Courier and the second semifinal was played by Sampras and Jimmy Connors.
Match one against Agassi and Courier was exciting. Since it’s an exhibition match, there was a lot of joking between the two opponents, teasing the ball boys/girls and interacting with the crowd. It was nice to see this different side to the players because if this was Wimbledon, you would be sitting in an arena filled with serious spectators and super-focused players. Courier held his own against Agassi, but in the end, Andre proved too good and beat Courier 6-3.
Unfortunately match two against Sampras and Connors was lackluster. I’ve watched Sampras play tennis a million times so I know how good he is. Against Connors, the audience could tell Sampras was taking it easy and trying to give the fans a competitive match. That’s not to say that Connors was horrible; certainly not. For someone who is 59 years old and who hasn’t played a competitive tennis match in 10 years, he performed well and he even got off three or four really excellent shots. Perhaps Connors didn’t eat his Wheaties that morning and was having an off night. In the end, Sampras won 6-4.
Finally the match everyone wanted to see; Pete versus Andre! This was a dream come true for me. Not only did I have the honor of watching these two play in person, but now I got to see them play against each other. The electricity coming from the audience was amazing as we watched these two legends warm up and prepare for yet another match to add onto their long-time rivalry. Who cares if it wasn’t for a US Open championship? These two brought their best game and in an exciting match that went to a tie breaker, Sampras pulled ahead with an 8-7 (5) victory.
The Champions Series was a lot of fun and for people like me it gives us the opportunity to finally see in person players whom we watched for years on our televisions. If the tour comes around to your city, I highly recommend checking it out. For more information, please go to http://www.championsseriestennis.com/
