History of Tennis

Tennis is a racquet sport, which originated in Birmingham, England. The aim of the sport is to hit the ball over the net, landing it within the court on the other side. Points are scored if your opponent cannot make a good return. Tennis was originally known as 'lawn tennis' and was played on grass but it is now played on a number of surfaces including clay and hard-court surfaces such as acrylic or asphalt. 

Tennis can be played between two people (singles) or four (doubles). In doubles the players on each side take it in turns to take service games and the court is made wider to include the 'tramlines' on each side. Both men and women play tennis at professional level. 

Tennis is a hugely popular recreational sport but, at the top level, it is a fast, highly competitive professional game with huge prizes at stake for the winners. The Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) administrates the men's tour and the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) organise the women's tour. 

ATP and WTA tour events take place all over the world and run throughout the majority of the year. Professional players' performances at ATP and WTA tour events earn them ranking points, with the most ranking points attached to the highest profile tournaments. The ranking points are used to determine who the best players in the world are at any one time.

The highest profile tennis tournaments are the four Grand Slams; these are the French Open held at Roland Garros in Spring, the Australian Open held in January at Melbourne, the US Open held in late summer in New York, and Wimbledon held in late June in London. Regardless of wins on the ATP and WTA tours, professionals are really judged against their performances at these events. For men at least, these tournaments differ from others in that matches are the best of five sets rather than best of three; this means that they provide a much sterner mental and physical test than the rest of the tour.

Over the years there have been some iconic players in both the men's and women's game but few have been more successful than Roger Federer, who holds the record for the most ever men's Grand Slam wins. In the women's game Margaret Court won 24 singles Grand Slam titles between 1960 and 1975, six more than her nearest challenger Martina Navratilova. 

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