Mouratoglou’s Wimbledon picks draw Becker’s scepticism

Patrick Mouratoglou has put names to the best Wimbledon and US Open players in history, and Boris Becker is not convinced. The exchange is a useful reminder that “greatest ever” lists say as much about the person compiling them as about the players.

What Mouratoglou said

In an Instagram video, as reported by Tennis365, Serena Williams’s former coach went category by category. For the men’s all-time Wimbledon title he gave it to Roger Federer, with Novak Djokovic close behind. He framed it as a small battle between the two, settled by Federer’s style of play. For the women he chose Serena over Martina Navratilova, arguing that she played in a considerably stronger field. At the US Open he picked Pete Sampras.

He was also asked about the current grass-court standard. According to the same report, he named Jannik Sinner as the most dominant player on the surface over the past three years, while saying there is no obvious best woman at present because the Wimbledon champion changes every year. Italian outlet Ubitennis notes the clip was recorded in late August, so the picks are not a reaction to anything that has happened this week. They have simply resurfaced.

Becker’s counter-view

Becker, a six-time major champion who later coached Djokovic, responded on social media. As Tennis365 reports it, he said he was very surprised by the choices and that most tennis experts would disagree. Becker did not, in the coverage we have seen, offer his own alternatives, so the disagreement is one of tone rather than a rival list.

That matters. It is not clear which of Mouratoglou’s picks Becker objects to. The Federer call is the easiest to defend on the numbers: Federer won Wimbledon a record eight times, while Djokovic and Sampras have seven each, according to Tennis365. The Sinner pick is a judgement about recent form rather than a record. The Serena-over-Navratilova choice rests on an argument about the strength of the field, which is the hardest of the three to settle with statistics.

Where the real disagreement lies

Mouratoglou’s reasoning leans on style and era. Federer’s game suited grass, and Serena competed against deeper opposition. Those are arguments about quality. Becker’s objection, as far as it can be read, is about consensus. Neither is wrong, but they do not meet. A coach who watches players as a technical problem will naturally weigh how a game is built. A former champion is more likely to weigh what the wider tennis community believes.

There is also a point of agreement that sits quietly under the row. Tennis365 notes that both men regard Djokovic as the greatest men’s player of all time. The dispute is confined to one tournament, which makes it more a quarrel over methodology than over legacy.

Context

This is not Mouratoglou’s first appearance in the pundit debate this month. We covered his forehand comparison of Alcaraz and Sinner, where Tim Henman went further than he did. Becker has also been in the news as a defender of Alexander Zverev’s year-end ranking, in our earlier piece.

The wider lesson is that all-time rankings get most heated when the criteria are hidden. Counting titles favours Federer at Wimbledon. Weighing the opposition favours Serena. Asking who is dominant now favours Sinner. Each of Mouratoglou’s three Wimbledon picks uses a different yardstick, and that, more than any individual choice, may be what Becker found hard to accept.

Until either man spells out his reasoning, the clearest reading is that this is a disagreement about how to judge greatness, not about who was great. The Tennis365 report is a single-source account of a social media comment, and it is worth treating Becker’s remark with that in mind: it is a short reaction, not a considered critique.