A Tale of Two Champions
A tribute to Sir Andy Murray and Angelique Kerber
All champions may have reached greatness in their own unique way. But what binds pretty much all of them together is one thing: their struggle with the last dance. If you’re a champion who’s winning, why stop? You’re winning. And if you’re a champion who’s losing, why stop? You’ve won before, who says you can’t do it again? Finding the right moment to sail off into the sunset, then, is complicated. The picture perfect ending, a final flourish with a big title or crowning achievement, pretty much never exists.
But the fight that drives most champions to the stratosphere means that they also rarely leave with a whimper. The last dance is often still an incredible fairytale despite it’s imperfections, something I was reminded of when the tennis tournament at Paris 2024 gifted us with not one, but two incredible stories.
Prologue: Eerily Similar
It’s scary how eerily similar Sir Andy Murray and Angelique Kerber’s careers were. Both won three grand slam titles. Both became the world No. 1 in 2016 and finished that same year on top. Both were Olympic medalists. Both were revered for their court coverage, speed, counterattacking ability, and their unwillingness to give up no matter how dire circumstances seemed on both a micro and macro level. Both ended their careers at this year’s Paris Olympics. And it was only right that both reached the quarterfinals in their respective last dances.
Here is a tale of two champions.
Part One: Iron Man
It was clear from the start that Murray was a name to pay attention to. He won the Junior US Open in 2004, and by 2006 had won his first ATP title and broken into the top 20. By the time he turned 21 in 2008, Murray was firmly entrenched in the top 10 and had reached his first grand slam final at the US Open. And that’s when Murray ran into the problem that largely defined his career. Well, more like three problems.
Murray’s rise to the top of the tennis world came at a time when men’s tennis was dominated by Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. And to make matters worse, his rise coincided with that of Novak Djokovic. Every great champion has to contend with rivals and already existing greats on their way to the top, but Murray had the misfortune of contending with rivals who happened to also be the three greatest male tennis players to have walked this Earth so far. It’s a testament to Murray’s fight and skill that he was the only one who was able to regularly challenge the Big Three at their peak. In fact, he ended his career with a 8-6 record against them in Masters 1000 finals (5-5 vs. Djokovic, 1-1 vs. Nadal, and 2-0 vs. Federer). But there’s a reason why the conversation about the Big Four at the start of the 2010s soon turned into a conversation about the Big Three. More often than not, and especially when it mattered the most, Murray fell short. His 11 slam finals are the ninth most in the Open Era, but he only has three slams to show for it because he came up against one of the Big Three in 10 of them (2-5 vs. Djokovic and 0-3 vs. Federer). Murray himself summed it up best after losing the 2010 Australian Open final to Federer: “I can cry like Roger, it’s just a shame I can’t play like him.” He would go on to still lose another final to Federer on home soil at Wimbledon in 2012, becoming just the second man ever to lose his first four major finals.
The major breakthrough finally came a few months later in New York, where Murray beat Djokovic to win his long awaited first slam. The fact Murray threw away a two sets to love lead, leading to the joint-longest final in the tournament’s history at 4 hours and 54 minutes, was appropriate. There was nothing that screamed Andy Murray more than him winning an incredibly long match that arguably had no business being that long in the first place.
After becoming the first Brit in 77 years to win the Wimbledon men’s singles title in 2013, Murray’s next breakthrough came during a spectacular 2016 season. He started the season with a fifth Australian Open final and a first (and only) French Open final, before winning a second title at Wimbledon and a second gold medal in men’s singles at the Olympics. His incredible end to the season (he reached the finals of 12 of his last 13 tournaments, won five straight titles, and went on a 24 match win streak), saw him become the first person since 2004 not named Federer, Nadal, or Djokovic to reach the top of the rankings.
But success is very much a house of cards—a painstaking build that’s stunningly quick to collapse. After Murray finally scaled the summit, everything fell apart in the most heartbreakingly literal way possible. He was forced to end his 2017 season after Wimbledon due to a hip injury which caused him to undergo surgery in 2018. But he made clear before the 2019 Australian Open he was still in too much physical pain and was considering retirement. After he lost a four hour epic in the first round, a video montage of player tributes was broadcast in honor of him. Which was awkward considering Murray said in his post-match press conference he wasn’t committed to retiring yet. And even more awkward in hindsight given everything that happened next.
Murray, like any great champion, refused to limp quietly into the sunset. A recommendation from doubles legend Bob Bryan led him to undergo Birmingham Hip Resurfacing (BHR), a hip replacement alternative in which a metal cap is placed over the femur (or thigh bone for those looking for the English translation) and paired with a metal cup in the acetabulum (pelvis socket). The operation’s success led him to return to professional tennis six months after he had originally floated the possibility of quitting. Cue the Iron Man jokes.
Yet the Iron Man Murray years were not defined by any newfound physical indestructibility. That’s not to say there weren’t any superhuman feats of strength—his comeback victory against Thanasi Kokkinakis in the second round of the 2023 Australian Open lasted 5 hours and 45 minutes! But the setbacks had neutralized the court coverage and speed that were key to Murray’s counterattacking game. He never made it past the third round of a slam or higher than No. 36 in the world rankings after his hip resurfacing. But despite father time bearing down, multiple injuries, and a new wave of younger opponents, Murray’s iron willpower remained as strong as ever. The last few years were illustrative of his determination to keep going even when all hope seemed lost, and there was no better microcosm of all of this than Paris 2024. At age 37, Murray and doubles partner Dan Evans saved five match points in the first round to keep his career alive. They saved two more in the second round before finally succumbing in the quarterfinals. It may not have been the perfect ending, but it was very much still a fairytale. Like every opponent who ever faced him, retirement learned the only way to finally defeat Murray was to wrestle victory from his iron grasp.
But beyond the on-court accomplishments and the tales every highlight reel will tell, people would do well to remember Murray’s accomplishments off the court. There was no better champion of women’s tennis among male tennis players than Murray, who was an outspoken advocate for gender equality in the sport and never hesitated to call people out over comments that undermined the achievements of female tennis players. In 2017, a reporter asked him at Wimbledon about his thoughts on Sam Querrey becoming the “first US player to reach a major semifinal since 2009.” “First male player,” Murray corrected. When he hired former women’s No.1 Amélie Mauresmo as his coach in 2014, he became only the second top 10 player in history on the men’s tour to work with a female coach. When the press attributed a slump early on in their tenure to her coaching, Murray was quick to point out none of his male coaches ever received criticism for his previous dips in form.
"Have I become a feminist? Well, if being a feminist is about fighting so that a woman is treated like a man then yes, I suppose I have,” Murray wrote in a 2015 column for L’Équipe. Tennis, both women’s and men’s, was better off with Murray’s outspoken advocacy and support of the women’s game. In his absence on tour, I can only hope other male players will pick up where he left off.
Part 2: Care Bear
If you had told someone at the start of 2010 that the woman who would win the most grand slam singles titles during the 2010s would be Serena Williams, the response you would get is: “Who else?”
If you had told them the woman who would win the second most grand slam singles titles over that same period would be Angelique Kerber, the response you would get is: “Who?”
They wouldn’t be wrong. Like any sport, the greats in tennis often show their potential early on. Kerber, on the other hand, never won a junior title. Even ignoring the fact junior success is often a poor barometer of success on the senior tour, her early career results after turning professional were so meager she wouldn’t have even qualified to be a footnote in the tennis history of 2007-2010. By the summer of 2011, she was 23 years old and only had one tour level final and a career high of No. 45 to show for her efforts. An early retirement beckoned. “I am slowly running out of strength,” she recalled telling her mother in her autobiography. But her family convinced her to keep going, and what followed was a series of some of the most extraordinary plot twists in 21st century tennis history.
The first plot twist occurred at the 2011 US Open. Kerber reached the semifinals despite being ranked No. 92. She lost to eventual champion Samantha Stosur (then a top 10 player), but not before pushing her to a final set. That improbable run kickstarted a rise up the rankings that saw her finally break through the top 10 the next year, where she would become a near constant presence over the next few seasons.
But just because Kerber had finally made it into the higher echelons of tennis didn’t mean people gave her any serious consideration. In the debate of who would challenge Serena Williams’s near-absolute supremacy on the women’s tour, Kerber was relegated to a footnote. From 2012-2015, she was ranked as high as No. 5 but had only reached one slam semifinal and two quarterfinals. Other players her age had either been ranked higher or had better results in the majors. In many cases, it was both. Kerber, then, found herself regarded by many as being a player who was always the bridesmaid but never the bride.
After a poor start to her 2015 season, Kerber found herself asking questions once more. Was she capable of being a top player? Yes. Was she capable of winning a major title? She was beginning to have doubts. This time, the intervention came not from her family, but from her compatriot and childhood idol Steffi Graf. The two met up, and over a few days Graf convinced Kerber she had what it took to not just compete on tennis’s biggest stage, but win. It was the boost of confidence Kerber desperately needed to hear, and it couldn’t have come from a more trustworthy source. If anyone knew anything about winning, it was Graf. After all, she did win—a few—major singles titles during her time. 22 to be exact.
With intervention #2 done with, the stage was set for plot twist #2. And if anyone thought the first plot twist of Kerber’s career was wild, this one was even more mind-blowing.
Heading into the 2016 Australian Open final, Serena Williams was at the peak of her powers. She hadn’t dropped a set on her way to the title match. She’d lost just 26 games across six matches and twelve sets. She was 21-4 in major finals and had won eight straight. The last time she had lost to anyone at this stage of a slam was in 2011.
On the other side of the net was Kerber, who was not only playing in her first major final but had also been a point away from losing—in the first round. The question on everyone’s minds was not the result, but how many games she would manage to win against Serena. The lack of serious talk surrounding Kerber’s chances was ironic given she’d beaten Serena once before back in 2012. But everyone had written it off as a fluke—Serena couldn’t win every match, and she was an even better player in 2015-2016 than she was back then. No one dared to say aloud that Kerber had a real chance to push Serena, not to mention defeat her. To do so would have been suggesting you were in need of a psych evaluation.
It was perhaps precisely because no one gave Kerber a chance that made what happened that night in Melbourne even more extraordinary. After the two split the first two sets, convention once again dictated Serena would pull through. Beyond her incredible record in major finals, she was also a perfect 8-0 in deciding sets of title matches. Kerber, it seemed, was destined for the runner-up plate and a round of applause for her valiant effort. But nothing about Kerber, from her adopted lefty game (she’s actually right-handed) to her career trajectory, was conventional. So it was only fitting that she once again confounded convention that night, defending and counterattacking her way to one of the biggest upsets in tennis history (available in its full glory on YouTube). A first major title at 28 years old only made the result sweeter. How good was her performance? Serena, never one to mince words if she felt she had thrown victory away, said afterwards she didn’t believe she’d lost the match. Kerber, in her view, had simply outplayed her on the day and won it.
From there, the plot twists continued to unfold. After Australia, many still believed her fortnight fairytale was a fluke. A Wimbledon final that summer (where Serena got her revenge) and a US Open title a few months later (she became the first woman in 19 years—and the only one so far this century—to win both hard court majors the same year) were proof Australia was not a one-off. Her US Open win also cemented her as the oldest woman to make her No. 1 debut in the singles rankings. The critics, it seemed, had been silenced.
But much like how Murray’s incredible 2016 gave way to a nightmare 2017, the same was true for Kerber. If plot twist #3 had been her ability to maintain the form she showed in beating Serena across an entire season, plot twist #4 was her failure to do so once the expectations were placed squarely on her shoulders. A disastrous season saw her drop out of the top 20 for the first time since 2012, and the critics roared back with a vengeance. Kerber may not be a one slam wonder, they said, but she was looking like a one season wonder.
Enter plot twist #5. Kerber roared back in 2018, finishing the season No. 2 in the world. The highlight of the season was a run to the Wimbledon title, where she once again faced Serena. After 2016, you’d think people learned their lesson and would give Kerber a chance. Instead, the consensus was that Serena was the favorite despite being only months returned from maternity leave. Once again, Kerber defied expectations. A straight sets victory in 65 minutes (in which she only committed five unforced errors) saw her not only win her third major, but become only the second person ever to defeat Serena in multiple major finals. It also made her the only one of the five players who faced Serena in multiple major finals who walked away from those matches with a winning record.
The final plot twist (#6? #7? Does it really matter at this point?) came at Paris 2024. Kerber had returned at the start of the season from maternity leave. Like Murray, the brilliance was still there, but it came in bursts now instead of in free flow. Before the Olympics, she announced it would be her last dance. Many predicted a quiet first round exit.
At this point, I’m sure you know where the story’s headed. You probably don’t need me to tell you rule #1 about Angelique Kerber is to never underestimate Angelique Kerber. But it seems like that simple lesson was one that eluded pretty much every tennis pundit over the course of Kerber’s career. So while everyone will tell you what happened next was a surprise, no one should have been shocked that it actually happened. At 36 years old, Kerber became the oldest woman to make the singles quarterfinals of the Olympics. In her final match against world No. 7 and eventual gold medalist Zheng Qinwen (who was also more than 14 years younger), she saved three match points in the deciding tiebreak before Zheng finally put her away after more than 3 hours. It was another imperfect but beautiful fairytale ending. Once again, retirement found itself needing to wrestle victory from the iron grasp of a champion.
Like Murray, Kerber’s on-court accomplishments will define her as much as her off-court ones. She won the Diamond ACES Award in 2017 for her efforts to promote women’s tennis. And like Murray, she was known for being a friendly face off-court. It makes sense, then, that some fans nicknamed her Care Bear (say it three times fast). She cared about every point in a match, she cared about promoting the sport she loved and giving others even better opportunities to accomplish their dreams like she had, and she cared about being a decent person while going about doing all of that.
Epilogue: All Smiles
After ending their careers at the exact same time, it’s fitting that Kerber and Murray will probably be immortalized in tennis history at the same time too. Both are guaranteed hall of famers, and the fact they retired in the same year means they’ll most likely end up being inducted together once they become eligible in 2029. And I can’t think of a better way to commemorate the two greatest counterpunchers in tennis history so far this century.
The final chapter may have been bittersweet, but the epilogue is guaranteed to be all smiles.