The UNIQLO Interview: 30 Years of NEC Singles Masters champions | ITF
Article 13 Dec 2024

The UNIQLO Interview: 30 Years of NEC Singles Masters champions

Marshall Thomas

13 Dec 2024

The 2024 UNIQLO Wheelchair Tennis Tour has included many memorable moments, landmarks and anniversaries, not least the 30th Anniversary of the NEC Wheelchair Singles Masters and the 10th Anniversary of the beginning of UNIQLO’s sponsorship agreement with the ITF as title sponsor of the Wheelchair Tennis Tour.

Therefore, for our last UNIQLO Interviews of the year, we will celebrate both anniversaries, starting with memories from seven of the 28 different men’s, women’s and quad singles champions during the 30 years of the NEC Wheelchair Singles Masters.

Wheelchair tennis gained it year-end singles championship in 1994 and the NEC Singles Masters played a significant part in the career of its inaugural women’s champion, Monique Kalkman-van den Bosch.

Two years earlier Kalkman-van den Bosch hade made history by becoming the first official women’s singles gold medallist at a Paralympic Games after defeating fellow Dutch player Chantal Vandierendonck in straight sets in Barcelona. So there was something particularly fitting that the same two players should contest the first two Singles Masters finals, with the same outcome as Kalkman-van den Bosch won both contests in straight sets.

“I remember my first and last performance at the Masters very well,” she says. “1994 (in Eindhoven) was a year at the height of my career. After a long year of travels and tournaments around the world, this tournament was special.

“It was a first, a special one and a hometown one for me. And very special because this was the first time my mum would come and watch. She had not seen me winning Paralympic medals or other titles, so I really wanted to make this one special for her as well. And I did, fortunately.

Here again, both Randy (Snow) and I had a first one-off, like we did in Barcelona, with both winning two golds at the first Paralympics,” adds Kalkman-van den Bosch. “As mixed doubles partners at other events and with these wins, we had a very special bond. Unfortunately Randy is not with us anymore to remember this.

“At my last Masters in 1997 we had two other special spectators…juniors with a dream - Esther Vergeer and Sonja Peters. The final was the last match of my career and after this match i passed on my rackets, symbolically, with the message, now it is your turn. And the rest is history.”

By the time that Kalkman-van den Bosch had finished runner-up to Maaike Smit in her last Singles Masters final in 1997, three Dutch players had won the women’s title in the space of four years, but the Dutch domination was about to move to another level as Vergeer began her 14-year reign in 1998, as a 17-year-old.

“I remember it (my first final) very well, as the match was very tight with Maaike Smith,” Vergeer recalls. I had only beaten Maaike for the first time that season, both times in three sets, and to win at such big event in such a tight match was unbelievable. Because I was so exhausted from the whole week and the nerve-racking matches I played, I broke down in tears. I remember that I cried a lot after the match.

“The Masters was really something to be able to participate in,” she adds. “I was looking up to all the players I wanted to become. And for me, winning it gave me a lot of confidence in wanting to become the best player in the world.”

Ten years on from Vergeer’s first Masters final, the 2008 season brought two of her most memorable matches against Kore Homan, in the Beijing Paralympics and the Singles Masters finals. Vergeer won both matches in three sets, but in the 2009 Singles Masters final the pressure intensified as Homan came within two points of beating Vergeer during a second set tie-break.

Recalling 2008, Vergeer says: “I had just won my gold medal in Beijing against Korie Homan. A very tight match, during which I had been match point down. The Masters was the event after the Paralympic Games where Korie and me faced each other again. She was very eager to win this time. I lost my first set first set during that Masters to Korie, but eventually was able to win again. There was a lot of pressure on my shoulders, and I think that is why it stands out for me.

“I loved that extra kind of pressure. I always wanted to do good there (at the Singles Masters). Also, because most of the times it was in the Netherlands during my career and my family and friends came and watched. I really enjoyed it.”

During Vergeer’s record 14-year reign as NEC Singles Masters women’s champion, the two most prolific winners of the men’s and quad singles titles also graced the year-end championships roll of honour. Robin Ammerlaan claimed his six men’s titles between 1999 and 2007 and David Wagner won the first four of his record 11 quad titles.

Ammerlaan won the last four of his six Singles Masters titles in the space of five years - a feat later to be matched by four-time champion Joachim Gerard, but during Ammerlaan’s first and last titles the only man to prevent a 10-year run of Dutch men’s winners was Australia’s two-time Singles Masters champion David Hall.

“As the years ticked over, the Masters was the tournament I couldn’t win.” says Hall. “Year after year I couldn’t even make the final. It was turning into my white whale. The one that would irk me in retirement decades later. Mix in the quickness of the blue rubber surface, then the carpet, the end of a long season, seven other fantastic players and it all added up to failure after failure.

“Finally, in 2002 I came in a bit fresher and beating Ammerlaan to win it was one of the best matches of my career,” adds the six-time ITF World Champion. “And winning in 2004 over Michael Jeremiasz was just as special, especially considering I needed to win both matches (in the round-robin and the final) to finish the year as number one.”

In winning the first of his four Singles Masters titles in 2015, Gerard prevented world No.1 Shingo Kunieda from completing a Masters four-timer, while also breaking another of Kunieda’s significant winning streaks. Gerard takes up the story….

“Shingo hadn’t lost for more than 70 matches in a row, so I was really emotional when I first beat him (in the round-robin) in 2015. We were on centre court twice that week and in the first match I was 5-1 or 5-2 up in the third set and started making more mistakes and he came back to 5-5, so I said to myself that now was the moment to be more solid and I made two good games. I was so happy.

“In the final I was 3-0 down in the third set and I remember taking my towel and putting it over my head and making a small room just for me,” Gerard adds. “I closed my eyes and said ‘now, you don’t make any more mistakes’. It was unbelievable on the way home when my coach told me I had not made even one mistake from that point on. I was the most sold guy for six games in a row for probably the first time in my career. It was a very big moment for me to twice beat the player I consider to be the GOAT.”

Such was the impact of what Gerard had achieved that he would go on to beat Kunieda a further six times in the coming years – three of those wins coming at the Singles Masters.

“It certainly helped me to be more confident in everything I did after that because 2016 was one of my best years, making my first Grand Slam final at the Australian Open a few weeks later, winning my bronze medal at the Rio Paralympics and reaching world No. 1 for the first time,” he says. “So winning the Masters really helped with all of that.

“I’ve always loved the format of the round-robin because it gives you one joker card, let’s say, If you win the first match you’re a little bit freer for the second match and it’s easier to play the third one because if you won the first two you are normally qualified for the semi-finals. So the format is one that I enjoy and has really helped me to do well at the Masters.”

On many occasions over the last 30 years securing the year-end world No. 1 ranking has either depended on winning the NEC Singles Masters or out-performing others contending for the top spot.

It was the scenario faced by David Hall in 2004, the same year that David Wagner won the first quad singles draw held at the Singles Masters, and it did for Wagner in 2017 as he won the 10th of his record 11 quad singles titles.

“I have two very special moments,” says Wagner, 20 years on from his first Singles Masters title. “The first and most special was when the quad division was finally in the Masters in 2004. The second moment is when it came down to the final match of the year in 2017 between me and Andy Lapthorne and whoever won would end the year as number 1 and be honoured for the first time at the ITF World Champions Dinner.”

From Wagner’s 11 titles to a player who currently has just the one Singles Masters title after contesting a succession of finals, the year-end championship has particular significance for 2022 champion Sam Schroder.

“I officially qualified for the Masters for the first time in 2017, because I was in the top six and the same day that I heard that I was qualified for the Masters I got my (cancer) diagnosis,” Schroder reflects.

“When I first got diagnosed the most important thing, of course, was that I was alive, but then also, the most important thing in my life after that was tennis, so to be able to come back in 2019 and finally be able to get to play the Masters was amazing. It was very special to be able to make that trip to Florida after all that had happened.”

After losing out to fellow Dutchman Niels Vink in the 2019 semi-finals and the 2021 final, Schroder had his championship moment a year later.

“I’d had a couple of good performances already, but winning it, especially in your own country, is always better, of course. It was very special. Most people don’t often get the chance to watch us live so that was a great opportunity for friends, family and sponsors to watch me and that really made it special to be able to celebrate it with everyone else for the first time. To call yourself Masters champion or world champion is very special.”
To call yourself Masters champion or world champion is, indeed, very special. To be able to call yourself Singles Masters champion and Paralympic champion in the same year is also very special. Only a few have achieved it but 2024 has been the first year that each of the men’s, women’s and quad singles Paralympic gold medallists have also all gone on to add the NEC Singles Masters titles in the same season.

Among then is Yui Kamiji, now the only non-Dutch player to win both the Singles Masters women’s title and a Paralympic women’s singles gold medal.

It’s 11 years since Kamiji won the first of her two Singles Masters titles in Mission Viejo, USA, but it’s a moment that lives fresh in the memory.

“I still vividly remember winning the Singles Masters title for the first time in the USA,” says Kamiji. “I played Jiske Griffioen in the final, who I had also played in the same group of round-robins earlier that week. Unlike other tournaments, players can only go through to the semi-finals depending on the results of the other players (in the round-robin). On the other hand, you get a chance to play again, just like me in 2013. It’s a difficult format, but I think it’s a very appropriate tournament to decide the final singles champion of the year among the top players.”

Kamiji lost to Griffioen 6-3 3-6 6-1 in their round-robin match in 2013, but came back to win the women’s singles final 7-6(3) 3-6 6-4 to break the 19-year winning streak for Dutch players.

“At that time, I didn’t know I was the first non-Dutch winner until the end of the tournament,” adds Kamiji, whose Singles Masters title this year ended another nine-year dominance from Dutch players. “And even in Paris this year, I didn’t know that Dutch players won all the singles and doubles gold medals since the 1992 Barcelona Paralympics. I was also surprised to hear from Shingo (Kunieda) that I am the first Japanese to win double gold medals in the same Games.

“Every Masters is held in places we don’t usually visit on tour, so the experience is very fresh and has a lot of memories. Especially when the tournament was in England,” says Kamiji as she recalls attending the players’ party in London in 2014, having been told that there was a dress code for the event.

“It was my first time going to such an occasion and I hurriedly bought a new dress. On the day I wore a gorgeous dress that I don’t usually wear. But the players around me were wearing nice but casual clothes, and I stood out by myself,” laughs Kamiji. “It’s a funny story now, but it’s a shameful memory looking back then.”