Monica & Steffi

[italo36]

Monica is the most gracious one in this report however she was the one that was robbed of her career, she would never be the same player again and would never regain her previous form

[italo36]

An absolute shame what happened to Monica's career, the stabbing changed the history books in Graf's favor which makes me sick

[mirzic81]

Rennae Stubbs is an idiot.....talking Steffi into playing that day! How disrespectful. You were gonna teach anyone anything by playing on and pretending nothing happened

[alanis9090]

Monica is so full of grace, even to this day.

[ricannabis]

Thanks for the upload!

[MisterMusic74]

i believe steffi when she said she tried to reach her in a private way etc. steffi hates the limelight and she is a very honest person.

[JamieOwen03]

i feel like balling everytime i watch this, Serena reminds me of the early Monica a bit as in when it comes to the slams and slam finals she is ready more than any other time of the year.teen monica was prbably the strongest mentally who ever played, i mean 8 slams by the age of 19! COME ON!

[linny50]

Another  example of a thoughtless and insensitive bad WTA moment was that after Monica returned to tennis the YEC was switched to Germany even though Monica vowed to never play there again but chasing the money,they did it anyway.

[IloveMonica4ever]

@linny50 who manipulated this to happpen???? this is a very question we need to dig into. remember Monica started to play very well again AFTER graf retired in 1999. if it was really manipulated, the intention is very EVIL

[jmahrky]

it just sickens me to death knowing that mad man who in a blink of an eye destroys a major part of tennis. we as fans were robbed of what could be the best rivalry in tennis history and who knows how much they would've pushed each other to the very limits of immortality. both steffi and monica are legends and rightly so deserving!!!

[italo36]

@jmahrky

I agree with your statement however Monica was the one who would have made the history books according to all the tennis experts, Monica was that good and dominating Steffi 3-1 in slam finals and winning 7 of 8 slams she had entered before the stabbing and don't forget Monica was 4 years younger than Steffi and already had 8 slams at barely 19 and Steffi only 11 at 23 when the stabbing happened and Monica was only getting better and better in her domination of the world of tennis

[Flupptrack]

I have said this very often: we were robbed of more potentially great tennis matches when that idiot stabbed Monica in the back. In spring of 1993 Steffi had fought herself out of a 2 year slump and the work with her new coach was new coach was finally paying off. The summer grand slams would have been terrific. This rivalry would have been a second Chris-Martina rivalry with both players coming out equally strong. Steffi would have had the edge on faster courts, Monica on slower.

[mananal32]

What happened to Monica was terrible. Her records and Steffi's would be absolutely different. Everyone who knows about tennis and is fair knows this simple fact.

[JamieOwen3]

i dont blame steffi one bit...BUT i lost respect for her nd most of the other players when they voted against monica to freeze her no 1 ranking,plus yeah steffi was a victim going back to winning 3 of 4 slams a year after the stabbings i feel so sorry for her!!!wtf that crazy bastard took a great champions future away from her with a knife.chris evert is right

[juju1305]

I think so two.

there were two things that were really disgusting.

1) the fact the the tournament got played normally to the end, with Sanchez-Vicario celebrating like crazy when she won.

2) the voting from players about monica's ranking. It was a wta responsibility, they should not have asked players to take position.

[mrnaf]

Bud Collins is a idiot. Suggesting that only Graf was improving. Monica at the time was also getting better and better. Just look at the 1993 Aus Open final. It's very sad because I think both players would have pushed each other to bigger and better heights.

[newmark401]

I agree. The fact is, at the time of the stabbing Seles was only 19, while Graf was only 23, so they both had a lot of great tennis left in them and would have played each other in many more finals.

[juju1305]

I agree with you, Monica's AO93 final was a major sign of improvement. she served more aces than ever before against Graf, ventured to the net more often and also managed to dominate wit her groudstrokes. It was her first win against Graf on a surface other than clay. All points that she was not about to let Graf dominate the rivalry, despite the one-sided wimbledon final months before.

[DEBBIEGIBSON22]

@juju1305 I couldnt have put that better myself. Seles was definetly improving as a player and the ao93 final was a clear sign of that, its just a shame that we never got to see the player she would have become over the following couple of years. I always felt that when she came back late95 and from then on her fitness was always in question, motivation etc, she was never the same but then who would be after that happening to you.

[juju1305]

@DEBBIEGIBSON22 Hi Debbie,

thanks for your great feedback. I so agree with you and I find it harsh that some people say Monica used it as an excuse to underperform. The AO final is pretty much the best level of focus, power and precision Monica achieved it's sad that we never go to see how far she could go.

[IloveMonica4ever]

No. Bud Collins is actually very on the Seles' side. for different reasons, he has to say that