This is an analysis of 432 tournaments played from ‘68 until today. Federer is the best by percentage and number of victories, Delbonis the worst: 0-12.
by Nicola Gillio, translated by Carla Montaruli
Analysing the men’s results from the men’s side of tournaments on grass from the beginning of the Era Open (1968) until today, 432 is the number obtained that represents the tournaments played, including Halle and Queen’s played last week. For the first two years, the tournaments Open (not just on grass) were few, 17 in 1968 and 30 in 1969. This statistic will take into account all tournaments in those two years following the official ATP Tour position.
All these tournaments took place in only 10 nations around the world, England is leading with 184 tournaments followed by Australia with 80, then the United States with 70, and Germany with 38. Closing the top 5 the Netherlands close the top 5 with 10 tournaments and New Zealand with 10.
Roger Federer’s records on the grass
Roger Federer is the player who won the most matches on grass, has the highest percentage of matches won out of those played, and has the longest streak of wins. He won the most Wimbledon (8) titles and the most tournaments. Considering these numbers, there is no doubt that to date the Swiss was the best player on grass in the Open Era.
First things first, let’s break down the several statistics in more detail. At least 184 tennis players won one tournament on grass, of these 105 won one, 32 won two, 15 won three, and 32 players won at least 4 (as well as the Italian Matteo Berrettini).
This is the comprehensive list of the players who have at least four titles on grass:
1 | Federer, Roger (SUI) | 19 |
2 | Sampras, Pete (USA) | 10 |
3 | Connors, Jimmy (USA) | 9 |
4 | Laver, Rod (AUS) | 9 |
5 | Djokovic, Novak (SRB) | 8 |
6 | Hewitt, Lleyton (AUS) | 8 |
7 | Mcenroe, John (USA) | 8 |
8 | Metreveli, Alex (RUS) | 8 |
9 | Murray, Andy (GBR) | 8 |
10 | Rosewall, Ken (AUS) | 8 |
11 | Smith, Stan (USA) | 8 |
12 | Amritraj, Vijay (IND) | 7 |
13 | Ashe, Arthur (USA) | 7 |
14 | Becker, Boris (GER) | 7 |
15 | Borg, Bjorn (SWE) | 7 |
16 | Newcombe, John (AUS) | 7 |
17 | Roche, Tony (AUS) | 7 |
18 | Edmondson, Mark (AUS) | 6 |
19 | Edberg, Stefan (SWE) | 5 |
20 | Graebner, Clark (USA) | 5 |
21 | Kriek, Johan (RSA) | 5 |
22 | Roddick, Andy (USA) | 5 |
23 | Rusedski, Greg (GBR) | 5 |
24 | Berrettini, Matteo (ITA) | 4 |
25 | Isner, John (USA) | 4 |
26 | Lopez, Feliciano (ESP) | 4 |
27 | Mahut, Nicolas (FRA) | 4 |
28 | Nadal, Rafael (ESP) | 4 |
29 | Okker, Tom (NED) | 4 |
30 | Rafter, Patrick (AUS) | 4 |
31 | Ruffels, Ray (AUS) | 4 |
32 | Stich, Michael (GER) | 4 |
In this ranking, Federer towers over all the others with 19 tournaments (8 Wimbledon, 10 Halle, and 1 Stuttgart Open). Sampras follows with 10 (7 Wimbledon, 2 Queen’s e 1 Manchester Open), then Connors with 9 (3 Queen’s, 2 Wimbledon, 1 Australian Open, 1 US Open, 1 Manchester Open, and 1 Birmingham Open) and Laver with 9 as well (2 Wimbledon, 1 Australian Open, 1 US Open, 1 Sydney Open, 1 Boston Open, 1 Queen’s, 1 Baltimore Open, and 1 South Orange Open).
Percentage of victories on grass.
If we look at the statistics of best percentage (at least 30 matches played), only 24 players manage to have a result of 75% or more and only 4 are still active players (Djokovic, Berrettini, Murray e Nadal):
Federer leads also the ranking for most wins (192), below are considered all players with “at least” 100 matches won on grass.
Let’s move on to rankings that consider how many placements from the quarterfinals onward have been achieved; the first place is always occupied by Roger Federer with 40, followed by Newcombe with 35 and Connors with 34.
The United States and Australia are the most prolific nations
If we analyse the same statistics considering the nations (68 are the ones to have had at least one tennis player place from the quarterfinals onward). The United States and Australia on grass have obtained results significantly higher than all other nations, partly thanks to their larger number of players involved.
It is worth noting that the sum of the placings of the first three nations (1737) is greater than the sum of the remaining 65 (1689).
Winning streaks and other curiosities
Also of interest are the longest Open Era winning streaks on grass:
- 65, Federer from Halle 2003 to Wimbledon 2008 when he lost to Nadal in the famous final
- 41, Borg from Wimbledon 1976 to Wimbledon 1981. It was J. McEnroe who ended his dominion, defeating him in the final
- 28, Novak Djokovic from Wimbledon 2018 to date, still running
Other Interesting facts:
- Until 1974, three of the four Grand Slams were played on grass (Wimbledon, the Australian Open, and the US Open at the West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills, New York)
- In the Open Era, 6 of the 432 tournaments played were not concluded due to adverse weather conditions (Queen’s 1968, Adelaide 1970, Bristol and Eastbourne 1971, Nottingham 1976 and 1977)
- The player who has lost the most matches on grass without winning any (0-12) is Argentine left-hander Federico Delbonis, followed by Russian Sergei Likhachev with 0-10; however, if we consider the players who have won only 1 match and have the most losses, tied with 1-13 are Australian Carl Limberger, German Bjorn Phau, and Ecuadorean Eduardo Zuleta.
- A tournament has been won by a qualified player only on 6 occasions. In 1985 in Adelaide (E. Edwards RSA), 1991 Manchester (G. Ivanisevic CRO), in 1996 Halle (N. Kulti SWE), in 2009 S’Hertogenbosch (Benjamin Becker GER, not the famous Boris), and in 2013 and 2015 also in S’Hertogenbosch (Nicolas Mahut FRA). On the other hand, only once did it happen that a lucky loser won a tournament on grass, in 2009 in Newport the American tennis player Rajeev Ram, No. 181 in the world.