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¤3¥2JOHN MCENROE - A

CLOWN OR A LEGEND¥1¤1


John McEnroe is 33 years old now,  and
after fifteen years in the tenniselite
he's decided to quit.   Grand Slam Cup
in   Munich,   Germany  was  his  last
competition.

He  began to play  tennis when  he was
eight. After only two weeks he won his
first tournament.
  He was  discovered and  he entered a
tennis  school.   After  a  couple  of
months he  was thrown out  due  to bad
behaviour.   And  this  was  only  the
beginning.  His whole career  has been
followed by a very bad  behaviour.  He
has    been   yelling   at   referees,
screaming  at  linesmen  and offending
opponents.
ð
  New York Times once wrote this about
him:  ¤4"McEnroe is our  worst publicity
since Al Capone"¤1.

His  misbehaviour  has  made  him  pay
fines for  a total of 125,000 dollars.
But  that's small expensives for a guy
who has  earned  about  twelve  miljon
dollars - only in prize money.

John  McEnroe  has  seven  Grand  Slam
titles, 77 single titles and 76 double
titles. He was number one in the world
for  170  weeks  and  the  best double
player  for  257 weeks.   He  was  the
youngest  number  one in  the  history
when  he entered the position for  the
first time (March 3rd, 1980).   He has
played the longest match of the modern
tennis  history;  six  hours  and   22
minutes.    That was in Davis Cup 1986
when he beat Mats Wilander.
Ð
  His best period was in the beginning
of the eighties,  especially 1981 when
he  among  other  things  broke  Bjorn
Borg's  great  succession in Wimbledon
(Borg won the Wimbledon Cup five times
in a row between 1976 and 1980).

The unique thing about John McEnroe is
that  he  managed to  play  well  even
though he had a miserable temperament.
He  was  able  to  be  real upset when
others had to stay calm and kepp their
thoughts composed.

Privatly he seems to be a  quite  nice
guy. He has for instance donated a lot
of money to different charity funds.
  1986  he married  Tatum O'Neal  (the
actress), and now they have three kids
together - Kevin, Sean and Emily.
  Rumours are  saying that  both Kevin 
and  Sean have the same rude behaviour 
as  their   father,    so  if  we  are
ð
(un)lucky we'll see another McEnroe in
the  tennis  elite  in  about  fifteen
years or so!

¤3Here's  a  short  list of some  of his
achievements throughout his career:¤1

¤3July 1981:¤1 Wimbledon.  Here he got his
first fines after, among other things,
having shouted  "You can't be serious"
at the referee. It was very close that
he got  himself disqualified two times
in the match against Tom Gullikson.
  Finally he won  the competition, but
he was  still angry.  He boycotted the
winner's  dinner   (a  dinner  to  the
winner's  honour is  always  arranged,
atleast in fashionable Wimbledon).

¤3May 1983:¤1 He had to pay a fine of 1000
dollars after  having  insulted  Tomas
Smid in Forest Hills.
Ð
¤3October 1984:¤1  McEnroe went berserk in
Stockholm Open.  He shouted, swore and
smashed  bottles and  flowers with his
racket. That cost him 6000 dollars.

¤3January 1985:¤1  He was dropped from the
American Davis Cup team due to his bad
behaviour in the  final against Sweden
in December 1984.

¤3June 1985:¤1  The Queens tennis club  in
London   deprived   McEnroe   of   his
membership of honour after he insulted
the chairman's wife.

¤3September 1987:¤1   Very  bad  behaviour
made him pay  18,000  dollars.  He was
also forbidden to play for two months.

¤3January 1990:¤1 He was thrown out of the
Australian Open  after  three warnings
in  the match against Mikael Pernfors,
Sweden.   He  also  had  to  pay  7000
ð
dollars.

¤3July 1991:¤1  Wimbledon again. This time
his anger was aimed at a linesman when
he  was  eliminated by  Stefan Edberg.
Fine: 10,000 dollars.
Ð