The first image of Gabriela Sabatini was taken at a tournament south of Miami Beach, around 1990.
Obviously, being as beautiful as she clearly was, and having spent so much time on court being photographed, there are many good photos of Sabatini around. But, photographically speaking, I believe she looked her best at the back end of the eighties and the first couple of years into the nineties... and she easily puts Barbikova in the shade.
This picture has an iconic quality worthy of a painting, with only a hint of racket to suggest it is on a tennis court and not in some Passion play.


Gabriela Sabatini possessed some of my all-time favourite strokes. Her topspin and slice backhands are so clearly defined, that they have always been great models for youngsters to copy, which is why I've used so many images of her in the book.

Some time in the early 90s I interviewed Sabatini in a one-on-one. Before the interview I went to some trouble preparing my questions, and we sat together in the player’s lounge, with her family and full entourage in the background, including the ever-present (wo)man from the WTA.
As much as I tried I couldn’t kick-start a conversation and Gabby just mouthed the kind of vague platitudes that have become so familiar in sport. One consequence, perhaps, of having spent her life on a tennis court, detached from the real world, where real opinions are formed as you bump, grind, and grit your way through everyday situations.

Too often these days, tennis players are treated as commercial entities or commodities, to be cosseted and shielded from the real world, lest 'the product' gets a whiff of other interests, and wants to break free of unreality, where flattery is on 24 hour tap and you can never say what you truly mean, lest you accidentally devalue the currency that you have accidentally become.

There has always been a healthy ambivalence in my feelings towards the world of tennis, especially as I've got older.
Yes, the skill of the participants and the competition can be breathtaking, and the game itself is a joy to play, especially for the young.
Yes more-so, Francis de Sales is right when, in reference to sport, he wrote:
'It is a pity to sow the seeds of vain and foolish tastes in your heart, taking up the place of better things...'.
Better things indeed!
But watching Gabby on court the next day, all loops, whips, swings and dips, and a skirt flailing in the trail of her lovely centrifugal arc, it all made sense. Actually, no. It didn't make sense. It has never made sense. But asking questions that called into question this 'f****ed up tennis life' (as Agassi describes it) seemed once again surplus to requirements. While you are in the game, why not just shut up and play it?

As I left my interview with Sabatini, and walked from the air conditioned player's lounge into the heavy night air, the man from the WTA followed me out to tell me earnestly, 'that's the most interesting I've ever heard Gabby give!'
Well thank **** I didn't have to sit through the others!

Viewed from the real world, the nearest Gabby and I got to 'interesting' was right at the end, when we began to chat about music. As I picked up my bag to leave, I gave Sabatini my tape of an album I was listening to at the time, by The Art of Noise.
Sabatini smiled naturally for the first time.
Never did find out if she liked it.