Wimbledon: Navratilova rolls back the years in quick time | Sport | The Guardian
Wimbledon 2004
Navratilova rolls back the years in quick time
The nine-times champion turns everything to her advantage to become the oldest player at 47 to win a singles match in the championships in the open era
Tuesday 22 June 2004 18.32 EDT
First published on Tuesday 22 June 2004 18.32 EDT
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At Caesars Palace in Las Vegas there are statues that rumble and move, startling those who have not seen them before.
Poor Catalina Castano wore the same expression of bewilderment on Court Two yesterday as she was disposed of 6-0, 6-1 in 46 minutes by Martina Navratilova , the 47-year-old dowager of serve-volley who became the oldest player to have won a singles match here since Wimbledon went open in 1968.
Navratilova played her first match at Wimbledon in 1973, wearing a dress given to her by Fred Perry that was too tight and made her itch and she went on beat Christine Janes before going out in the third round. Ted Heath was in No10, Sunderland's FA Cup win sent Bob Stokoe into a dance macabre and Garry Sobers and Rohan Kanhai were touring England with West Indies. That was six years before Castano was born.
Yesterday Janes's daughter Amanda was playing on Court Three as Navratilova, like something out of a museum of the moving image, brushed her opponent aside with an athleticism that belied her years. There are younger players here who are lining up in the 45-and-over Gentlemen's Invitation Doubles.
The Colombian must have felt a little like Mark Twain's Hank Morgan, the Connecticut mechanic who awoke to find himself transported back to sixth-century Camelot.
Clearly nervous, she even allowed herself to be aced by a serve of 73mph. That is about the speed you might be doing in the middle lane before flashing lights invite you to the inside. And she thought the speed gun was fast.
Everyone loved Martina all over again. She was not universally liked here when she first played on these lawns as a chubby Czech and started a run that was to bring 20 Wimbledon titles, including half her 18 grand slam singles championships.
She won six of those in consecutive years between 1982 and 1987. But her last singles appearance here was in 1994, when she lost a three-set final to Conchita Martinez. Now she is vulnerable and very beatable; somehow that fits more easily with the British sporting psyche.
This was the first match to be completed yesterday. And it would have been quicker but the for the rain which brought an hour's delay with Navratilola leading 5-0 after 16 minutes.
"Oh, wow, did you see that?" asked a voice of pure nostalgia as the legend picked a half-volley off her ankles before powering away yet another volley winner. On this form her only worry could be that her singles challenge might get in the way of her real purpose here, the defence of the mixed doubles title she won with Leander Paes. Most people play doubles to sharpen up their singles; Martina is doing it the other way round.
It seems ridiculous, for this is the greatest woman player of them all, but Navratilova played with the spiky flourish of one with something to prove. In Paris she was blown away in the first round, 6-1, 6-3 by Gisela Dulko, whom she now meets here, and the decision to give the 700th-ranked player a wild card for these championships was a controversial one.
"I told you guys that I would be competitive here. Now do you believe me?"
She scampered for everything, clench-fisted the air when she won a rare, competitive point and did not relax at all until she was leading 6-0, 5-0. Then, after 38 minutes, Castano won her first game points and was bathed in sympathetic applause when she converted one of them - just as Navratilova had been when she finally won a game in Paris.
Afterwards, Navratilova spoke with sadness about the early retirements of Martina Hingis, Monica Seles, Tracy Austin and Andrea Jaeger. Raging against the dying of the light, she seems to be making up for all of them.
"I have an advantage because I know how to play on grass, period. I know how to play tennis, that's an advantage. I've been doing it for a long time.
"I have advantages on many fronts just because I've been doing it for many years and I'm a better athlete than most. Everything's an advantage. I'm a lefty. That's an advantage. I'm smart. That's an advantage. I have a lot of advantages and I put them to good use."
She plans to open an academy to pass on her matchless experience. But not just yet.