There was a time when Dublin was an international tennis hub and the Irish Open ranked as one of the major tournaments in the world.
Innovative, it was the first to run both men’s and women’s singles and doubles competitions side by side.
Its stature as a top tennis destination was almost comparable to Wimbledon as it attracted many of the best players in the game.
Variously hosted in well appointed squares in Dublin including Pembroke Place, Wilton Place, Fitzwilliam Square and Appian Way (where Fitzwilliam Lawn Tennis Club is now), the storied event stood for decades among the top grass court destinations anywhere.
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In 1879 Vere St Leger Goold was crowned champion beating Charles David Barry 8-6, 8-6. From Clonmel, Goold also made it to a Wimbledon final before disappearing from the tennis scene.
[ Dublin to host pre-Wimbledon ATP Challenger tournament in June ]
From a wealthy family he reportedly spent much of his money on alcohol and opium before turning up in 1907 as the defendant in a murder trial. Convicted of the killing of Emma Levin and the placing of her body in a suitcase, Goold was sentenced to life imprisonment on Devils Island where he took his own life.
Less piquant a character and more effective around the court, William Renshaw, a power player of his time, won the Irish Open three times in a row in 1880, 1881 and 1882.
He added those to his seven Wimbledon singles crowns, a record held until it was equalled by Pete Sampras in 2000 and beaten in 2017 by Roger Federer.
Joshua Pim, a medical doctor from the Dublin suburb of Killiney, also won three successive Irish Open singles finals up to 1895 to add to two Wimbledon wins.
James Cecil Parke came on to the scene at the beginning of the last century. As well as being a quality tennis player Parke also played rugby for Ireland and was an accomplished golfer and first-class cricketer.
Parke won the Irish Open eight times, the last coming in 1913, and he competed in the 1908 Olympic Games, where he won silver in the men’s doubles.
Later in the last century some of the most decorated players in the game, such as Rod Laver and Tony Roche, came to Dublin. Laver won in 1962 and Roche twice in 1965 and 1970.
In the women’s event Maud Watson, the teenage daughter of the vicar of Berkswell, won the first of her two Irish titles in 1884 and the same year became the first women’s singles champion at Wimbledon, beating her sister Lilian in the final.
Americans Helen Wills Moody in the 1930s and Maureen Connolly in the 1950s, outstanding players of their generation, both won the Irish Open. “The Sao Paulo Swallow”, Maria Bueno, a multiple winner of Wimbledon and the French Open, won in Dublin twice in the early 1960s.
Margaret Court, Billie Jean King – who won 12 Grand Slam singles titles – Evonne Goolagong and Virginia Wade all came to the Irish Open to add a pizazz and a truly international flavour to the competition.
Ireland has a rich history in tennis. In the 1980s, 1990s and early this century several events took place outside of the main tour that attracted players of the calibre of an ageing John McEnroe, Mats Wilander, Pat Cash, Yannick Noah, Martina Navratilova, Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario, Anke Huber and Pam Shriver.
What the original Irish Open had working in its favour was that it was scheduled to take place the week after Wimbledon finished.
The clever timing allowed players from the other side of the world, such as Australian Laver and Brazilian Bueno, to compete in Dublin, a short boat or plane journey from London SW19.
In recent years, though, Ireland has seen little top-class tennis and very few of the recognisable figures of the game, which makes the recent announcement of an ATP Challenger 75 tour event to take place in Dublin a welcome addition.
It is the first tournament of this level to be staged in Ireland for 18 years.
To be played in Elm Park Golf and Sports Club in Donnybrook, it won’t attract the biggest names in tennis the way the Irish Open once did, but it has been judiciously placed on the calendar a week before the qualification tournament for Wimbledon begins and it will be played on grass, which makes it an attractive option.
The Irish tournament starts on June 14th, just as the biggest pre-Wimbledon event, the Queen’s tournament in Kensington, ends, with the Dublin finals scheduled for June 20th.
While the entries have not been announced, the Irish event may catch the eye of those players who are looking for grass court competition before the Wimbledon qualifiers begin in Roehampton on June 22nd, as well as those on the ATP Tour chasing ranking points during the grass season.
Ireland have not had a player in the main draw at Wimbledon since Conor Niland in 2011 and have not had an Irish player in a Grand Slam event since James McGee’s first-round loss in 2014 at the US Open.
The ATP Challenger won’t fix that quickly. Nor will it have the dash and glamour of the old Irish Open.
But the staging of a men’s professional grass court competition just before Wimbledon with a €95,000 prize fund has more than a nice ring about it.
