The three "cousins" Roland-Garros , the Australian Open, Wimbledon and the US Open make up the four events collectively known as the "Grand Slam". The concept can be dated back to 1933, when Australian Jack Crawford was on the verge of winning all four majors. Crawford had already won in Australia, France and England, and had battled through to the final of the US Championships in New York. John Kieran, sports writer at the New York Times, was a keen card player and in his column made an analogy with the Grand Slam in bridge: "If Crawford beats Perry today it would be something like a Grand Slam on the courts, doubled and vulnerable". Crawford would eventually lose at the very last hurdle, but Kieran's words had stuck. Since 2000, the ATP and the ITF jointly organise the Tennis Masters Cup for the season�s eight top players in the ATP Champions Race (one spot reserved for a Grand Slam champion within the Top 20).
Very few players have pulled off the Grand Slam (winning all 4 events in the same calendar year) since its inception 70 years ago. Donald Budge (1938) and Rod Laver (1962 and 1969) are the only men to have achieved it, Margaret Court (1970), Maureen Connolly (1953) and Steffi Graf (1988) the only women. As if it wasn't hard enough, the task of winning the Grand Slam got a whole lot harder a few years ago when the four tournaments began to be played on four different surfaces: Rebound Ace in Australia, clay at Roland-Garros, grass at Wimbledon and Decoturf at the US Open.
Andre Agassi is the last player to have won a career Grand Slam, his successes at Wimbledon and Roland-Garros separated by seven long years. With every passing year, the big four Grand Slam events gain in prestige. Let's take a quick look at Roland-Garros' three "cousins".
Australian Open The first Australian Open was held in 1905 at the Warehouseman's Cricket Ground, where it went under the name of the Australasian Championships until 1912, with Australia and New Zealand sharing the organisation of the event. Women were only allowed to enter in 1922 and it was not until the late 1970s that the major overseas stars made the long trip to compete on a regular basis. Unsurprisingly, therefore, almost all the winners prior to that time were Australian.
In 1972, the Australian Lawn Tennis Association decided to move the event every year. Sydney, Perth, Brisbane, and even New Zealand all played host to the championships, before the Open finally found a more stable home in Melbourne, first in Kooyong, then at Flinders Park in 1988. The move to Flinders Park coincided with two significant developments: the historic decision was made to transfer the tournament from grass to a hard surface called Rebound Ace, and the event became the only Grand Slam tournament to boast two courts with a sliding roof. Flinders Park was renamed Melbourne Park in 1997.
Wimbledon Wimbledon is the oldest tennis tournament in the world. The "Lawn Tennis World Championships" were first staged in 1877 by the All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club (who are still the organisers and owners of the courts today), the Ladies Singles were added in 1884. The Wimbledon Championships have never left the London district which bears their name, although they did move from Worple Road to Church Road in 1922, when the challenge round (a rule whereby the previous year's champion automatically qualified for the next year's final) was dropped.
Wimbledon is widely recognised as being the most prestigious tournament of all. Its strict regulations, such as its dress code whereby players are expected to be dressed mostly in white, are legendary. The Championships were only opened to professionals in 1974, following a boycott by the ATP the previous year. With seven Wimbledon Championships - 14 Grand Slam titles in all � Pete Sampras has the most outstanding record of any of the men's Champions.
US Open The US Open was first held at Newport in August 1881, where it was staged every year until 1918. The challenge round was abandoned in 1911. Until 1970, only clubs that were members of the United States National Lawn Tennis Association were permitted to enter. The Ladies Singles were first played in 1887 in Philadelphia, and it wasn't until 1919 that the men's and women's events were staged simultaneously at Forest Hill West Side Tennis Club in New York. The tournament was played on grass until 1974, and on clay from 1975 to 1977. The US Open was the first "major" to adopt the tie-break.
In 1978, the tournament moved to the Decoturf hard courts of Flushing Meadows in Queens. The US Open has the largest central court in the world : the Arthur Ashe Stadium was opened in 1997 and seats 23,000 fans. In 1999, the former central court was renamed the Louis Armstrong Stadium.
Tennis Masters Cup Winning Roland-Garros is every player's dream and a huge achievement in its own right, but it is also a stepping stone on the way to the Tennis Masters Cup. This year's champion once again stands every chance of qualifying for the annual showpiece, which is reserved for the eight top-ranked players at the end of the season.
The Masters Cup came into being in 1999, the product of the merging of the ATP Tour World Championship and the men's Grand Slam Cup, organised by the ITF. The tournament has been staged on a different continent every year during the past years. Gustavo Kuerten won the inaugural event in Lisbon, Europe back in 2000, Lleyton Hewitt then triumphed in front of his home crowd in Sydney, Oceania in 2001, before retaining his title in 2002 in Shanghai, Asia. In both 2003 and 2004, Roger Federer won the crown in America, Houston (Texas), playing host to the competition for the first time since 1976. And then the Tennis Masters Cup returned to Shanghai, to stage the season finale from 2005-2008.
The top eight players in the ATP Champions Race at the end of the season will qualify, with one important proviso - should a winner of one of this year's Grand Slams finish outside the top eight, as was the case for Albert Costa in 2002, he will still qualify for the Masters Cup providing he finishes in the Top 20.
