For the almost fifteen years before 1988, tennis was the Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova show. The icons had dominated the game and no one else was able to mount any kind of lasting challenge. But their stranglehold started to slip in 1987 and one year later, a new woman would rise and become the only true force in women’s tennis. That woman was a teenager from West Germany by the name of Steffi Graf.
In 1987, Graf rose to number one in the world and won her first major. But she would take her game to the next level in 1988, tearing apart the WTA tour with a season for the ages that remains one of the most dominant seasons in tennis history and threw down a gauntlet for the rest of the tennis world that has yet to be matched. Let’s take a look back at Steffi Graf’s stupendous 1988 season.
By the Numbers
Graf went 72-3 in 1988, winning eleven titles and reaching one further final. She reached the final in twelve of the fourteen tournaments she played. In fact, in terms of wins and titles, her season was slightly less impressive than her 1987 campaign, which saw her go 75-2, reaching the final in all thirteen tournaments she played, also winning eleven. On both occasions, she finished the year ranked number one.
