The 1985 French Open final was the 64th meeting between Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova. The head to head was 33 - 31 in Martina’s favour. Chris head beaten Martina earlier in the year after having recorded 13 straight losses to her opponent. This turned out to be one of the classic tennis matches with brilliant play and twists and turns right to the end.
Martina Navratilova won the toss and as it was a very wind day, she chose to receive. Chris Evert got off to a cracking start taking a 3-0 lead, although all three games were close. Considering the conditions Chris was hitting some very deep and accurate groundstrokes.
Martina then won the next three games and again all were close. From 3-3 Chris took the next three games bringing up set point with a second serve ace and closing out the set 6-3 by moving Martina from side to side with two excellent deep shots, the second of which Martina failed to control and hit out.
The second set began with a brilliant game by Chris to break Martina’s serve. Martina broke straight back. The third game saw Chris break Martina yet again. Games then went with serve to 4-2 with Chris continuing her high level of groundstroke play.
Martina then raised her game and took the next 3 games to lead 5-4 with some excellent net play. Martina had a set point in the next game which Chris saved with a beautiful backhand down the line. She then broke Martina to 15 to leave her serving for the match. A poor game by Chris saw her lose her serve and so take the set to a tie-break.
Martina rushed to a 4-1 lead in the tie-break as Chris made some errors including her first double fault. Martina held the avantage to 5-4 when Chris missed a passing shot to give Martina set point. Martina won the next point in a cagey 18 stroke rally when she rushed the net and hit a winning volley to take the tie-break 7-4.
Chris again got off to a good start to the third set by holding serve and breaking Martina. In the third game she had points to take a 3-0 lead but was eventually broken by Martina. Martina then played a poor game and was broken by chris to make it 3-1. Chris had opportunities to go 4-1 ahead but in a long game Martina eventually broke with a topspin backhand cross-court shot to bring the score back to 3-2.
Martina then served out to love to make it 3-3. Chris held with a struggle to 4-3 and then broke Martina with a brilliant cross-court forehand on the final point of the game to take a 5-3 lead.
With Chris serving for the match Martina broke back with a mixture of patience and great play. Martina got back to 5-5 with a love service game. In the following game Chris was 0-40 down and staring defeat in the face, she had only won one of the last 12 points. With a combination of good play from Chris and 3 unforced errors from Martina, Chris won the game. Martina was now under pressure and had to hold serve to stay in the match.
After some good tennis by both players in the final game, Chris got to match point when martina hit a volley long. In a fitting end Chris hit a superb backhand down the line to win the match. The final score was 6-3 6-7 (4-7) 7-5.
This was and epic match and one of my all-time favourites. Chris said, when interview on court after the match, that is was one of the most exciting matches she had ever played in and won.
Match available on DVD at Chris Evert DVDs webpage and on video at Tennis Videos website.
Tags: Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Tennis, womens tennis, wta tennis
