v2 G.O.A.T Round 2 Match 16

Below are the previous round 1 articles written by forum members

Please vote for the participant you believe has achieved the most in sport

Please leave a comment as to why you voted

Steffi Graf- Tennis- Championed by legendkillarV2

Arguably one of tennis's most gifted and successful players ever. 22 Grand Slam titles. 6 end of year titles. 69 other tour event titles. 377 weeks at number 1. Gold, Silver and Bronze Olympic medals. The only player ever to have won the Career Golden Calendar Year Slam. A feat which will never be repeated. The Fraulein Forehand as she was known. She had a lovely and velvet like backhand slice to match that of the great Rod Laver. Her footwork and speed was amazing. The game had simply never witnessed anything like it. It still hasn't.

Steffi began playing tennis at the age of 4 being coached by her tennis enthusiast father. By age 5 she had played in her first tournament. In 1982 she won both the under 12's and under 18's European Championships. She then turned pro at the age of 13 and her first match lost to 2 time Slam winner Tracey Austin. There was no doubt that this talented youngster was going to go far. In 1983 she broke into the top 100 of the world which for a 14 year old is just sensational. Let that sink in for a minute. The top 100 on the pro tour at the age of 14. At the age of 15 she won her first Grand Slam match. At the age of 16 she won her first pro title by winning the Family Circle Cup by defeating the legendary Chris Evert in straight sets.

It wasn't until 1987 when Steffi started to come to prominence. She won the Sony Ericsson Open and then went on to win in Rome. A month later and Graf was in her first Grand Slam final at Roland Garros. A week shy of her 18th birthday. Standing on the other side of the net was the greatest female player of them all. Martina Navratilova. A winning machine. The ultimate competitor. Graf was unbeaten in 1987. After a set all, it came down to a final set showdown. Nerve would fancy the more experienced Navratilova. Graf was 3-5 in the third. Navratilova double faulted serving for the match at 5-4. Graf broke the Navratilova serve and got 6-7. Match point. Navratilova served another DF thus handing Graf her first Slam title and making her the youngest female winner of the French Open. Navratilova however got her measure of revenge by beating Graf in the Wimbledon and US Open finals. Slam finals were many things which Graf would feature in. This would mark a run of 13 consecutive Slam finals for Graf.

1988. The single most amazing year in tennis history. She started the year winning her first Australian Open title. She overcame Chris Evert in straight sets. She won the title without the loss of a single set. She went on to Roland Garros where she defended her title by defeating Natalia Zvereva 6-0 6-0 in the final. The first time anyone had been bagelled in a Slam final since 1911!. Along came Wimbledon. She faced Navratilova who had won 6 straight Wimbledon titles. After losing the first set, Steffi found herself 2-0 in second. She rallied back and won 6 straight games to clinch the second set. Steffi then saw out the 3rd to win the match 7-5 2-6 1-6 and usher in new period of dominance. Graf then went on to win the US Open defeating Gabriela Sabatini in the final and then at the Summer Olympics in Seoul completed the most amazing year in tennis by capturing Gold. Thus sealing her place in history.

In her career she went on to win Wimbledon 7 times. 5 in a row. The French Open 6 times. The US Open 5 times and Australian Open 4 times. She appeared in 31 Slam finals. She won 18 Masters Titles making 24 finals. She won 5 end of year championships.

Quite simply she was the greatest player to have ever played the game.

Brain Lara- Cricket- Championed by VTR

"We can all look at statistics when we try to decide who is the greatest but sometimes seeing with our own eyes is the only way to judge. Bradman’s average, Tendulkar’s runs, Sober’s all-round feats are all there in the record books, but for sheer aesthetics there is the man with the high back-lift and flashing blade that made batting look so elegant you knew you were witnessing something special: that man is Brian Charles Lara.

Equally as devastating when facing fast, spin bowling or anything in between, Lara had the ability to dominate any attack in any part of the world. With a Test career spanning 1990-2006, playing at a time when opposition bowling attacks were almost universally strong (Wasim & Waqar, McGrath & Warne, Donald & Pollock), here was a batsmen who would have all in the ground enthralled as he played every shot in the book with such panache you would think he was playing a different game to everyone else. As an opposition supporter you’d somehow want him to stay in and get out at the same time; you knew the damage he could do, yet you would always want to watch more.

And it’s not as if the style was lacking in the way of substance. Far, far from it. In 1994 Lara destroyed a capable England attack to help himself to 375 runs and take the record for the highest individual Test score, overtaking Sober’s 365 which had stood for 36 years. This was merely the start of a purple patch of an incredible 7 hundreds in 8 first-class innings, culminating in a record that could, like The Don’s Test average stand forever: an innings of 501 not out against Durham when playing for Warwickshire in the County Championship. An entire team is generally elated with an innings total of 500+, but such was his hunger for runs Lara was able to achieve that many on his own.

When Matthew Hayden bullied a club-standard Zimbabwe attack for 380 runs a decade later to take away the record of highest individual Test score, the world wept that such a prestigious record could be achieved against such poor opposition. Thankfully Lara wasn’t finished, and with mutterings of a decline during an unusually subdued home series in 2004 he astonishingly took the record back with a chanceless innings of 400 not out. England were again on the receiving end, and despite having dominated the series for a 3-0 lead at that point were powerless to stop another innings of absolute genius. To put this into context, the record individual Test score has only changed hands 4 times since the Second World War. Lara stands apart in having gained the record twice.

Do you need any more convincing? An overall Test average of 52.88 is 17th on the all-time list, which is exceptional given the bowling attacks he faced, the lack of reliable batting partners in his later career and the challenges of captaining a team that was often in crisis for a large part of that. As the Windies decline set in from the mid to late 1990’s, Lara often seemed to be fighting a lone battle as a once-dominant team started to taste defeat on a regular basis. One of his most astonishing feats was somehow dragging the Windies to a 2-2 draw against the great Australia team in 1999. His innings of 153 not out in securing a thrilling one wicket victory in the Third Test is rated by Wisden as the second greatest Test innings of all time. Even more remarkable is that just days earlier he’d scored 213 in setting up a shock victory in the Second Test to level the series.

I haven’t even mentioned one-day cricket yet where Lara was one of the masters of his age, averaging over 40 in the shorter form and playing an integral part in the Windies shock run to the 1996 World Cup final. Naturally there was a defining innings in there: his masterful 111 off just 94 balls knocked the stuffing out of South Africa in the Quarter Final.

Some say when he retired in 2007 it was too early, the flourish was still there, he could still make a difference (Lara had averaged 66 in his final Test Series). But as with those flashing strokes, I’d say his timing was perfect. We were not to be subjected to any tarnishing of memories as a slow decline set in: we witnessed and will remember nothing but sheer beauty."

Just to correct my mistake in the write-up, the Windies reached the semi-final of the 1996 World Cup, not the final!

Lara was possibly the best batsman since Bradman, and I do mean possibly but Graf with all those grand slams wins it for me.
Great pins as well!

Stella wrote:Lara was possibly the best batsman since Bradman, and I do mean possibly but Graf with all those grand slams wins it for me.
Great pins as well!

The thought of Agassi near those pins has put me right off these days. I enjoyed them before their legacy was tarnished though!

Love the 'Prince of Port of Spain' to death; the greatest batsman I've seen within my own lifetime - certainly in test cricket at least, anyway - and in a team sport he did manage to turn it in to a one-man show now and then, so brilliant was he; the 153 not out against Australia at the Kensington oval in 1999, the two individual test score records of 375 and then 400 not out, the record 28 test runs he once thrashed his way to in one over against Sough Africa and also the way in which he absolutely stripped down and demolished the greatest bowler of the era, Muralitharan, when the West Indies toured Sri Lanka in 2001 / 2001.

That said, he can't get the nod ahead of Graf here. If there is a knock you can aim at Lara, it's that he wasn't always as consistent as some of the other top batsmen of his era (the Tendulkars, the Dravids, the Kallises etc). No such problem for Graf, who was a supremely consistent winning machine for a decade, a seriously long time in tennis.

Graf's 1988 stands as one of the most remarkable achievements by any sportsperson, regardless of era, discipline or circumstance, in history. You can speculate that the unfortunate, premature decline of Monica Seles afforded Graf a few more singles Slams than she would have had otherwise, but even without them I still believe she'd command a higher place within her own sport than Lara does within his - and this is a sport more physically demanding and widely-contested than cricket, too.

Lara a sporting great, Graf a sporting giant. So Graf it is, clearly.

The randomness of the draw certainly coming out here.

Both are some way from being the GOAT of their sport.

Despite his magnificent stroke play, Lara lacked the teamwork to be a true cricket great. Accordingly, Graf wins on a fault.

Graf by some margin.

Graf, IMO the best woman tennis player, Lara would struggle to make my all time test side so a no contest really.

im struggling to find spots for females in my greatest ever series, lets face it she would struggle to get into top 100 of the current mens game, of course because men have an advantage. but even still she was one of the truly greats of womens tennis which for me is the poorer version. can anyone imagine any of the current womens cricket or football teams ever being held up in the same esteem as the men

i have no problems at all with women playing sport, its simply when given a choice as a viewer i prefer to watch the truely best playing at there sport, who would rather watch a blue square premier match over the premier league as a neutral?

its seems there is only athletes and tennis where women are given such high esteem compared to all other sports, if the greatest female tennis player is right up there then i see no reason why the greatest female footballers / cricketers should be up there as well. for me i wouldn't pitch them against each other but rather have two separate awards as greatest female and male

I agree, compelling.

Am struggling to consider Lara as the best of his generation, let alone the best of his sport. Remember a quote I read in a cricket biography, maybe Hussein’s (maybe not) where he said if you were looking to chase down 400 on the last day of a test you would pick Lara, for any other scenario it would be Tendulkar. Tend to agree with this. Graf wins this one on default to a degree. Shows the vagaries of the random draw because am sure more worthy candidates will be eliminated sooner but such is life.

Lara to me is the most gifted batsman I've ever seen, and when he was good he was very very (VERY) good, as shown by the 400 in a Test and 500 in FC cricket. I've never seen anyone with such fast hands through the ball.
However, he was not the most consistent, and I think there's an argument that he too often failed to live up to his talent (a bit of the Ronnie O'Sullivan's? ). So although I loved (and sometimes hated) watching him as a player, I can't put him further through as the GOAT.

Steffi on the other hand has a fantastic record - huge numbers of tournament and slam wins, including the unique 'Golden Slam'. I wonder if her win over Zvonereva in the French Open final (6-0 6-0, for the loss of iirc 9 points in the match) is the most one-sided final in the history of slams. The only question mark about her is that her record agaisnt Seles prior to the stabbing was not very good.

Rowley wrote:Am struggling to consider Lara as the best of his generation, let alone the best of his sport. Remember a quote I read in a cricket biography, maybe Hussein’s (maybe not) where he said if you were looking to chase down 400 on the last day of a test you would pick Lara, for any other scenario it would be Tendulkar. Tend to agree with this. Graf wins this one on default to a degree. Shows the vagaries of the random draw because am sure more worthy candidates will be eliminated sooner but such is life.

You copying my work, Jeff?

guildfordbat wrote:

Rowley wrote:Am struggling to consider Lara as the best of his generation, let alone the best of his sport. Remember a quote I read in a cricket biography, maybe Hussein’s (maybe not) where he said if you were looking to chase down 400 on the last day of a test you would pick Lara, for any other scenario it would be Tendulkar. Tend to agree with this. Graf wins this one on default to a degree. Shows the vagaries of the random draw because am sure more worthy candidates will be eliminated sooner but such is life.

You copying my work, Jeff?

Only because spaghetti hans is not around to nick my ideas off.

Jeff - no problem! Now I have your attention, I would be interested in your answer to my question about Ali on today's other GOAT thread, cheers.

compelling and rich wrote:i have no problems at all with women playing sport...

That's very generous of you. I agree, as long my tea is on the table when I get home from work.

compelling and rich wrote:im struggling to find spots for females in my greatest ever series, lets face it she would struggle to get into top 100 of the current mens game, of course because men have an advantage. but even still she was one of the truly greats of womens tennis which for me is the poorer version. can anyone imagine any of the current womens cricket or football teams ever being held up in the same esteem as the men

i have no problems at all with women playing sport, its simply when given a choice as a viewer i prefer to watch the truely best playing at there sport, who would rather watch a blue square premier match over the premier league as a neutral?

its seems there is only athletes and tennis where women are given such high esteem compared to all other sports, if the greatest female tennis player is right up there then i see no reason why the greatest female footballers / cricketers should be up there as well. for me i wouldn't pitch them against each other but rather have two separate awards as greatest female and male

I dont really get this argument. All you are doing by seperating women and men is accepting that they are not physically matched.
If you cant do that and judge them equally, then surely you cant have the likes of Greb, Leonard and Robinson in the top 64 on this poll ? Boxing accepts that different people are of different sizes and creates categories to accomdate that. If it was a simple case of who would be the best ever catchweight boxer then Ali wins, yet very few rate him as the best boxer ever.
So if people accept this in boxing and most other contact sports and indeed rowing where they have different weight categories, why not accept women and men will be divided into different categories in most sports.

Diggers wrote:

compelling and rich wrote:im struggling to find spots for females in my greatest ever series, lets face it she would struggle to get into top 100 of the current mens game, of course because men have an advantage. but even still she was one of the truly greats of womens tennis which for me is the poorer version. can anyone imagine any of the current womens cricket or football teams ever being held up in the same esteem as the men

i have no problems at all with women playing sport, its simply when given a choice as a viewer i prefer to watch the truely best playing at there sport, who would rather watch a blue square premier match over the premier league as a neutral?

its seems there is only athletes and tennis where women are given such high esteem compared to all other sports, if the greatest female tennis player is right up there then i see no reason why the greatest female footballers / cricketers should be up there as well. for me i wouldn't pitch them against each other but rather have two separate awards as greatest female and male

I dont really get this argument. All you are doing by seperating women and men is accepting that they are not physically matched.
If you cant do that and judge them equally, then surely you cant have the likes of Greb, Leonard and Robinson in the top 64 on this poll ? Boxing accepts that different people are of different sizes and creates categories to accomdate that. If it was a simple case of who would be the best ever catchweight boxer then Ali wins, yet very few rate him as the best boxer ever.
So if people accept this in boxing and most other contact sports and indeed rowing where they have different weight categories, why not accept women and men will be divided into different categories in most sports.

this has nothing to do with size, its do with ability. this award is for the greatest ever sports people not the greatest under certain circumstances. steffie graf wouldnt be anywhere near an average male tennis player. yes alot is down to mens physical advantages, but alot is simply men are better technically, mentally as well as physically, take cricket for example where physical attributes count very little in batting, the best female counter part is no where near the ability of say tendulkar and thats why im saying there is no point in comparing the two as were talking the best sports people ever here graf simply isnt anywhere near her male counter parts. direct comparsion someone like paula radcliffe deserves much more credit, she's only about 12 minutes away from the male world record, yet she wont even get a look in.

there is a reason why heavyweight are always given the most kudos and many people wont be able to name a straw weight past or present, is becasue we all know the heayweight champ can beat anybody in the world doesnt mean they are the best boxers though.

i agree there is no problem in spliting men and women into different categories, for thier differing levels of ability to make better matches but dont think you can turn around and say graf is the greatest sports person ever when she's no where near the best tennis player ever. just dont think you can have it both ways

I dont agree, Graf and Navratilova are technically excellent players, its the phsical element that stops them competing. Im not sure how you would go about proving women are mentally weaker, I think you are on very dodgy ground there, the greats in any sport of any gender tend to be rocks mentally.
Women havent been playing football or cricket on any real mass level for that long, but I still think pysicality is massive. Tendulkar will be far stronger than an equivalent female, plays with a much heavier bat.

Diggers
Have you ever seen a woman playing in the world snooker final or world darts championship. have you also ever seen a woman actually kick a Football?

And when they mensturate the scent attracts bears.

Stella wrote:Diggers
Have you ever seen a woman playing in the world snooker final or world darts championship. have you also ever seen a woman actually kick a Football?

Of course ive seen women playing football. Ive played with a few who were pretty useful.
You do understand that they havent been doing these things in any great numbers for nearly as long as men, unlike in tennis when they have been playing the game for as long.
If you want examples of how women can compete with men look at 3 day eventing and show jumping. Lots of women ride from an early age and they are able to compete easily as equals with men becasue there is a big talent pool to build from.

So basically the argument is that Ricardas Berankis is a greater tennis player than Serena Williams?

Diggers wrote:

Stella wrote:Diggers
Have you ever seen a woman playing in the world snooker final or world darts championship. have you also ever seen a woman actually kick a Football?

Of course ive seen women playing football. Ive played with a few who were pretty useful.
You do understand that they havent been doing these things in any great numbers for nearly as long as men, unlike in tennis when they have been playing the game for as long.
If you want examples of how women can compete with men look at 3 day eventing and show jumping. Lots of women ride from an early age and they are able to compete easily as equals with men becasue there is a big talent pool to build from.

In most sports, including Tennis, women are not technically as good. harsh but true.

yeah mentally cant be proven, propbably scrub that i was more thinking about likes of cricket then when thats one of the biggest aspects of being a test match batter. i dont think physical matters much when batting, otherwise flintoff peterson should be better than lara, tendulkar.

i could equally turn it around and say graf and navratilova were only able to be so good technically because they played against weaker slower easier shots to face than the men do. federer is better because he has to do it against all types and many a stronger competitor. if you put graf againts williams, id back williams all day. we all know why but why do women get away with it yet there are many varying levels of strength in the male game that people have to overcome to become great.

the fact remains that im looking for the best sports people, the ultimate winners. any women in the list you know theres a male above them who was much better

Stella wrote:

Diggers wrote:

Stella wrote:Diggers
Have you ever seen a woman playing in the world snooker final or world darts championship. have you also ever seen a woman actually kick a Football?

Of course ive seen women playing football. Ive played with a few who were pretty useful.
You do understand that they havent been doing these things in any great numbers for nearly as long as men, unlike in tennis when they have been playing the game for as long.
If you want examples of how women can compete with men look at 3 day eventing and show jumping. Lots of women ride from an early age and they are able to compete easily as equals with men becasue there is a big talent pool to build from.

In most sports, including Tennis, women are not technically as good. harsh but true.

Yes...because the talent pool isnt as deep to produce the exceptional athletes. When it is they are technically just as good, how do you explain they are just as good technically at equestrian sports ? Women are just as good technicaly as men at swimming, at sprinting. They are technically better than men at gymnastics...because they have the talent pool advantage.
Its just numbers.

Gymnastics is a body form thing, surely? When it comes to hand eye co-ordination sports, men have the upper hand.

Rowley wrote:And when they mensturate the scent attracts bears.

they don't show that in the "Bodyform" adverts!

women are generally better at many of the gymnastic events, this has little to do with numbers but body shapes and basic gravity

id be quite happy for someone to put a female gymnast forward because they can be better than the males, unlike graf

Id love to hear a technical explanation of the gravity theory, or indeed body form.
Yeah, I guess its just pure coincidence that when the numbers are in favour of the women they are just as good.

Millions upon millions women cook and sew clothes yet the best cooks and designers are always men. Thank you and goodnight

i'll dumb it down for you, to do any kind of jump it takes a certain required amount of force the heavier the body the more force required, men are generally more muscle toned and weigh more than women due to higher bone density and higher levels of testosterone. women also are naturally more flexible, all of which are key requirements to many aspects of gymnastics events. meaning they have a natural advantage in many of them

Graf is a woman and surely can make no claim to be the GOAT. Best of the women perhaps, but she is not even close to being the best at her sport.

Don't vote for her then.

Lumbering_Jack wrote:Graf is a woman and surely can make no claim to be the GOAT. Best of the women perhaps, but she is not even close to being the best at her sport.

ive tried that one, save your breath he'll just ignore it

Lumbering_Jack wrote:Graf is a woman and surely can make no claim to be the GOAT. Best of the women perhaps, but she is not even close to being the best at her sport.

For once, I agree with Jack.

Lumbering_Jack wrote:Graf is a woman and surely can make no claim to be the GOAT. Best of the women perhaps, but she is not even close to being the best at her sport.

Presumably you'd rule out any paralympian on the same grounds?

Thus far we have had it argued that folk who operated in an era before colour TV should be excluded and now women should be excluded. Would have saved a lot of time and effort if we had just listed the current best in their sport and picked between them.

Rowley wrote:Thus far we have had it argued that folk who operated in an era before colour TV should be excluded and now women should be excluded. Would have saved a lot of time and effort if we had just listed the current best in their sport and picked between them.

But these is one of many reasons as to why this has been a good debate, Rowley.

Just think a better debate is to debate the candidates relative merits rather than whether huge swathes of folk should not be up for consideration.

Maybe but this debate would have been over an hour ago, if not

I've always figured what makes a great sportsperson is being above your peers. For women, their peers are other women. For pre-war players, that means other pre-war players.

To judge at an absolute level is a bit wierd. Obviously Bolt is faster than Owen, but so are hundreds of other sprinters - doesn't make them all greater than Owen.

Isn't a woman's peer another human?

Nobody is saying exclude them jeff, but were getting to the business end of this tournament now and only the "strongest" survive

Stella wrote:Maybe but this debate would have been over an hour ago, if not

You say it as if it is a bad thing!

compelling and rich wrote:Nobody is saying exclude them jeff, but were getting to the business end of this tournament now and only the "strongest" survive

I'm just feeling grumpy CnR, with all the whinging going on I am getting genuinely upset there is not a female pre war basketball player I can vote for.

Rowley wrote:

Stella wrote:Maybe but this debate would have been over an hour ago, if not

You say it as if it is a bad thing!

Kills time. Plus, Diggers makes some good points, to my sometimes narrow minded brain.

Rowley wrote:

compelling and rich wrote:Nobody is saying exclude them jeff, but were getting to the business end of this tournament now and only the "strongest" survive

I'm just feeling grumpy CnR, with all the whinging going on I am getting genuinely upset there is not a female pre war basketball player I can vote for.

I wasn't going to mention it, but Eleanor Mountfield's exlusion from this is a disgrace.

Stella wrote:Isn't a woman's peer another human?

Not when they compete against other women.
Esther Vergeer has retired - http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/disability-sport/21426554 - I doubt she could beat an able-bodied professional tennis player. Does that mean she can't possibly be a truly great sportsperson?

JuliusHMarx wrote:

Stella wrote:Isn't a woman's peer another human?

Not when they compete against other women.
Esther Vergeer has retired - http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/disability-sport/21426554 - I doubt she could beat an able-bodied professional tennis player. Does that mean she can't possibly be a truly great sportsperson?

But their's no reason to why they couldn't compete against men, if they were good enough. They have tried it in Golf and failed.