Monica Seles (Hungarian: Szeles Mónika , Serbo-Croat: Monika Seleš , , born December 2, 1973) is a former World No. 1 professional tennis player and a member of the International Tennis Hall of Fame. She was born in Novi Sad, Yugoslavia (now Serbia) to Hungarian parents and became a naturalized United States citizen in 1994. According to published reports in Canadian and Hungarian news media (including two newspapers of record), she also received Hungarian citizenship in June 2007. She won nine Grand Slam singles titles, winning eight of them while a citizen of Yugoslavia and one while a citizen of the United States.
She became the youngest-ever champion at the 1990 French Open at the age of 16. She was the World No. 1 player in the women's game during 1991 and 1992, but in 1993 she was forced out of the sport for more than two years following an on-court attack in which a German spectator stabbed her in the back with a 10-inch-long knife. She enjoyed some success after returning to the tour in 1995, including a Grand Slam singles title at the 1996 Australian Open, but was unable to consistently reproduce her best form. Seles played her last professional match at the 2003 French Open, but her official retirement announcement was not issued until February 2008.
Biography
Early years
Seles began playing tennis at the age of six, coached by her father, Károly Szeles. In 1985 at the age of 11, she won the Orange Bowl tournament in Miami, Florida, and caught the attention of tennis coach Nick Bollettieri. In 1986, the Seles family moved from SFR Yugoslavia to the United States, and Seles enrolled at the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy, where she trained for two years.
Seles played her first professional tournament in 1988 at the age of 14. The following year, she joined the professional tour full-time and won her first career title at Houston in May 1989, where she beat Chris Evert in the final. A month later, Seles reached the semifinals of her first Grand Slam singles tournament at the French Open, where she lost to World No. 1 Steffi Graf, 6–3, 3–6, 6–3. Seles finished her first year on the tour ranked World No. 6.
1990–92
Seles won her first Grand Slam singles title at the 1990 French Open. Facing World No. 1 Steffi Graf in the final, Seles saved four set points in a first set tiebreaker, which she won 8–6, and went on to take the match in straight sets. In doing so, she became the youngest-ever French Open singles titlist at the age of 16 years, 6 months. She also won the 1990 year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, defeating Gabriela Sabatini in five sets. She finished the year ranked World No. 2.
1991 was the first of two years in which Seles dominated the women's tour. She started out by winning the Australian Open in January, beating Jana Novotná in the final. In March, she replaced Graf as the World No. 1. She then successfully defended her French Open title, beating the former youngest-ever winner, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, in the final. Instead of playing at Wimbledon, however, Seles took a six-week break, blaming shin splints. But she was back in time for the US Open, which she won by beating Martina Navratilova in the final to cement her position at the top of the world rankings. She also won the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, defeating Navratilova in four sets.
1992 was an equally dominant year. Seles successfully defended her titles at the Australian Open, the French Open, and the US Open. She also reached the final at Wimbledon but lost to Graf 6–2, 6–1. Two opponents (including Navratilova in the semifinals) had strongly complained about Seles's grunting.
From January 1991 through February 1993, Seles won 22 titles and reached 33 finals out of the 34 tournaments she played. She compiled a 159–12 win-loss record (92.9% winning percentage), including a 55–1 win-loss record in Grand Slam tournaments. In the broader context of her first four years on the circuit (1989–1992), Seles had a win-loss record of 231–25 (90.2% winning percentage) and collected 30 titles.
1993 stabbing
Seles was the top women's player heading into 1993, having won the French Open three consecutive years and both the US Open and Australian Open in consecutive years. In January 1993, Seles defeated Graf in the final of the Australian Open, which to date was her third win in four Grand Slam finals with Graf.
However on April 30 during a quarterfinal match with Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg in which Seles was leading 6–4, 4–3, Günter Parche, an obsessed fan of Steffi Graf, ran from the middle of the crowd to the edge of the court during a break between games and stabbed Seles with a boning knife between her shoulder blades, to a depth of 1.5 cm (.59 inches). Parche admitted that he stabbed Seles to help Graf regain the No.1 ranking. She was quickly rushed to a hospital. Although her physical injuries took only a few weeks to heal, she did not return to competitive tennis for more than two years.
Parche was charged following the incident but was not jailed because he was found to be psychologically abnormal and was instead sentenced to two years' probation and psychological treatment. The incident prompted a significant increase in the level of security at tour events. Seles vowed never to play tennis in Germany again, criticizing the German legal system. "What people seem to be forgetting is that this man stabbed me intentionally and he did not serve any sort of punishment for it... I would not feel comfortable going back. I don't foresee that happening."
Young Elders, a band from Melbourne, Australia sent their song called "Fly Monica Fly" to Seles while she was recuperating from the 1993 stabbing incident. According to her autobiography, the song provided inspiration to her at that time and Seles subsequently met the band (who later changed their name to The Monicas) following her victory at the Australian Open in 1996.
The stabbing incident is also the subject of Dan Bern's 1998 tribute to Seles, Monica . Additionally, Detroit dreampop band Majesty Crush paid tribute with "Seles" from the 1993 album Love-15 .
Comeback
Seles returned to the tour in August 1995 and won her first comeback tournament, the Canadian Open, beating Amanda Coetzer in the final 6–0, 6–1. The following month at the US Open, Seles lost the final to Graf 6-7, 6-0, 3-6 after failing to capitalize on a set point in the first set.
In January 1996, Seles won her fourth Australian Open, beating Anke Huber in the final. But this was her last Grand Slam title. Seles struggled to recapture her best form on a consistent basis. Her difficulties were compounded by having to cope with her father and long-term coach Károly being stricken by cancer and eventually dying in 1998. Seles was the runner-up at the US Open to Graf again in 1996. Her last Grand Slam final came at the French Open in 1998 (a few weeks after her father's death). She defeated World No. 3 Jana Novotná in three sets and World No. 1 Martina Hingis in straight sets before losing to Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the three-set final.
While she did not reach another Grand Slam singles final, she did consistently reach the quarterfinal and semifinal stages in those tournaments and was a fixture in the WTA Tour's top 10. In 2002, her last full year on the tour, she finished the year ranked World No. 7 and defeated Venus Williams, Martina Hingis, Jennifer Capriati, Justine Henin, Maria Sharapova, Kim Clijsters, and Lindsay Davenport and reached at least the quarterfinals at each Grand Slam tournament.
After becoming a U.S. citizen in 1994, Seles helped the U.S. team win the Fed Cup in 1996, 1999, and 2000. She also won a bronze medal at the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney.
Period of hiatus
In the spring of 2003, Seles sustained a foot injury that sidelined her from the tour before the 2003 French Open. She never again played an official tour match.
In February 2005, Seles played two exhibition matches in New Zealand against Navratilova. Despite losing both matches, she played competitively and announced that she could return to the game early in 2006; however, she did not do so. She played three exhibition matches against Navratilova in 2007. On April 5, she defeated Navratilova in Houston, Texas on clay 7–6 (1), 2–6, 10–1 (tiebreak). On September 14, Seles defeated Navratilova on an indoor court in New Orleans, Louisiana 6–2, 6–4. On September 16, she defeated Navratilova on clay in Bucharest, Romania 3–6, 6–3, 10–7 (tiebreak).
In December 2007, Seles said to the press that Lindsay Davenport's successful return to the tour had inspired her to consider her own limited comeback to play Grand Slam tournaments and the major warm-up events for those tournaments. However, on February 14, 2008, Seles announced her official retirement from professional tennis.
Career assessment
Seles was listed as the 13th greatest player of all time (men and women) by (U.S.) Tennis magazine and was also one of 15 women named by Australian Tennis magazine as the greatest champions of the last 30 years (players were listed chronologically).
Sel
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