Matt Edben and Max Purcell have had an extraordinary doubles season in 2022 and the juggernaut has now extended to the most remarkable of Wimbledon titles with a victory over Croatian pair Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic at the All England Club.
The pair became the first Australian male duo to progress to two Grand Slam finals in a season since 2000, where the Woodies of Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde would claim the final two of their 11 major championships together.
The Australian duo were faced with the ultimate adversity, facing and saving a whopping eight match points en route to the historic title.
Ebden and Purcell would win five of their six matches in five sets at SW19, an astronomical number, in fact they are the only team ever to do so in the history of Wimbledon, something that they should be extremely proud of.
Wimbledon is the only Grand Slam to feature five set tennis for doubles, and who knows how long it will last for on the back of Nick Kyrgios’ comments ahead of the 2022 edition of the grass major.
“To be honest, I'm not really looking forward to playing best-of-five sets doubles," Kyrgios said at his pre-tournament media conference.
“I think it's the stupidest thing ever, to be brutally honest.
“I don't know why it's best-of-five sets.”
It’s a fair point, and it can be at the detriment to anyone who wants to focus on possibly doing an unlikely double, but without best-of-five tennis Ebden and Purcell were out in the opening round.
If the matches only stood at three sets, the Australians would have fallen in four of their six encounters, including the first, second, semi and the final itself.
It is quite staggering that they were able to pull it off.
In fact, the pair’s stamina and longevity must be held in the highest of regard, with no singles player even matching their amount of five-set wins at Wimbledon in the entire history of the illustrious tournament.
Only Ted Schroeder in 1949 has won four deciding set matches en route to the title, with Harold Mahony, Henri Cochet and Bjorn Borg hoisting the trophy by winning three that have gone the distance in 1896, 1927 and 1977 respectively.
It doesn’t happen much.
The history continues with the pair’s victory as they join Kyrgios and Thanasi Kokkinakis as the second all-Australian team to win a Grand Slam in 2022.
The last time that happened was a staggering 40 years ago, when John Alexander and John Fitzgerald teamed up to claim the 1982 Australian Open before Paul McNamee and Peter McNamara went on to claim that year’s Wimbledon.
Matt Ebden and Max Purcell have helped to bring doubles back into tennis folklore at home in Australia, with the nation getting behind the now affectionately known ‘M&M’s’ at Melbourne Park and now the All England Club.
Their victory was one that showed the Australian spirit, and it will go down as one of the greatest doubles Grand Slam victories in the history of tennis.
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