Riggs, revolution and a Rosewall win

When Ken Rosewall landed at a Paris military base for the 1968 French Open, both the city and his sport were in the midst of extraordinary revolutions.

Ken Rosewallin action in 1968.

When Ken Rosewall landed at a Paris military base for the 1968 French Open, both the city and his sport were in the midst of extraordinary revolutions.

The Australian legend, who will be lauded for his triumph at Roland Garros over Rod Laver 50 years ago in Paris next week, was successful in a famous Open after a preparation that would stun the stars of today. The tennis landscape had changed drastically, with professionals allowed back into the world’s most recognised events at the beginning of the Open era in March, 1968.

Rosewall, who claimed the French championship 15 years prior as an 18-year-old, was returning to Roland Garros for the first time in more than a decade and was hosted throughout the tournament by Philippe Chatrier.

Chatrier, the president of the French Tennis Federation at the time, now has the main stadium court at Roland Garros named in his honour and was a “good guy and good for tennis”, Rosewall ­recalls.

But in the midst of France’s most famous tournament, Paris was in turmoil.

Student protests effectively grounded the economy as they led to massive general strikes, the occupation of universities, factories and business across the nation, with the Charles de Gaulle regime forced to call in police.

Chatrier found himself dragged across the Seine and into the Latin Quarter to visit chaotic scenes, with Rosewall recalling “he had to be there to witness it, because it was part of French history”.

“He was politically involved in some ways, just being a true Frenchmen and he wanted to find out what was happening and what it was all about,” the eight-time major champion told The Weekend Australian.

Rosewall, who won eight French Pro titles in his time in exile, was 33 when he arrived in Paris but he felt match-hardened and fit.

The former world No 1 found himself in New York with a week to spare just before flying to ­Europe and received a surprise ­invitation from Bobby Riggs.

The chameleon’s starring role in the famed Battle of the Sexes clash alongside Billie Jean-King was recently made into a feature film.

As a Sports Illustrated article from 1973 puts it, Riggs “played tennis with kings of Europe, played footsie with queens of Hollywood, won Wimbledon once, Forest Hills twice, the World Professional Championship four times (and) took a honeymoon on an ocean liner”.

Rosewall, a four-time Wimbledon finalist, had thought he was in for a relaxing week when staying with Riggs in Plandome, Long ­Island, but the American was more interested in his pursuit of the dollar and put the Australian to work.

Every day, they would drive into an old steam train servicing factory converted into an indoor clay court centre, where Riggs would begin hustling.

“When I think back about it, Bobby Riggs was a gambler and I didn’t really know him that well, but knew of him, of course, and when we finished up in the New York area with a spare week, he said to me, ‘Why don’t you come home and stay the week?’,” Rosewall recalled.

“The next day he said ‘We’re going in to see so-and-so and so-and-so’. He had all these guys that played and they would play for pretty good size money and then Bobby said to me, at the end, we will have a set of singles and we will play for $100. I said ‘No, I am quite happy to play, but I don’t want to play for $100’.”

But Riggs was persuasive and each day, the four-time Australian champion would cop a harsher penalty.

Game handicaps. Points handicaps. And each day he prevailed until the last when the handicap, and the hustler, got square.

The Australian was giving the older American a “30-0” start each service game, a “0-40” start on his own serve and a 0-4 start overall, as well as the doubles alleys. Then Riggs threw in another handicap.

“I finally lost when he said, ‘The handicap was the same, but you have to serve with just one ball’,” Rosewall said.

“That was when he beat me. He had the whole lot. We finished even in the end.”

But Rosewall believes the preparation “helped me a lot”. And he also loved playing on clay having grown up on the surface at a complex owned by his father.

“In the early days, we classified them as hard courts in Sydney, but they were actually clay courts,” he said.

“As a little boy, I used to help my father water the courts and roll them and bag them and everything else until the end of the War, when he sold them.”

And, at the time of the 1968 French Open, he felt he had “had the edge on Rod there for quite a while”.

“We still had a lot of matches where I thought I would get him,” he said.

“I think my record on clay courts was pretty good. I played well on all surfaces, but I got to play well on every surface, but I was ­really a clay-court player in the early part when I was growing up.

“I was just an average player on grass, though I started to get better and play better and realised I had a fairly decent volley and I wasn’t afraid to serve and go to the net.”

Rosewall was a convincing 6-3 6-1 2-6 6-2 winner over Laver, the only man to win the grand slam twice, though the Queenslander avenged the loss the following year as part of his historic triumph.

Given his record, it seems possible the dual-champion will be called on to present the trophy to this year’s victor on Stade Philippe Chatrier. More importantly, the trip will most likely serve as a final farewell to a favourite spot.

“It will probably be my last trip, so I am looking forward to it,” Rosewall said.

“I think I would have won the French more times, or had a chance to win, had we been able to play there. I only played there five times. It has a lot of good memories for me.”