Borg vs. McEnroe - the duel that became legendary

July 5, 1980. Final in Wimbledon, a match that when it was over would be called the best tennis match ever played. Afterwards, books have been written and feature films made. For Björn Borg, it was the chance to write history, with a fifth straight Wimbledon title.

The meeting became so dramatic that SVT commentator Bengt Grive called it unpleasant.

The finalists couldn't be more different from each other. Icon Björn Borg, 24, who changed his tennis from the baseline, and the three-year-old John McEnroe of New York, who with fantastic wrists played tennis as if he were conducting a symphony orchestra. And the personalities; the low-key to the loud, one with ice in the blood, the other with fire in the chest, they were called "fire and ice, Superbrat and Iceman".

Media and audiences loved the meeting between the Swedish worldview and the new American worldview.

McEnroe won their first meeting, in Stockholm in 1978, but it was Borg who in the summer of 1980 had 4-3 in matches and a mental takeover before Wimbledon. "McEnroe will always be a little special to me," Björn Borg wrote in his 1992 memoirs, in which he also admitted that the American "sometimes gets a little crazy on the tennis court".

In an SVT interview, Borg explained the differences:

- Everyone is different. I prefer to be calm and not say much. Although I get angry within myself, I don't show it to the audience. McEnroe has to do other things on the court because that is his way of playing tennis ...

John McEnroe did not say:

- I am very competition oriented on the track and I want everything to be right. You can't change that overnight. Björn is not like that at all. But everyone has their own personality and that is what makes tennis so amazing.

Despite John McEnroe's reputation for swearing and screaming at referees, he was careful to always take care of Björn Borg. In his own memoirs in 2002, the American explained: “I never behaved like a pig when I played Borg. I respected him too much. I respected the opportunity too much… ”

When the rivalry was over a year later, after only four years, they had divided fraternally on the number of wins, 7-7.

But the match that is still most talked about is precisely the final on grass in 1980, in a Wimbledon where Borg was seen as descending from the tennis gods, against the unbrushed and in many cases, McEnroe hated. Both were in great shape.

After 2-1 in set to Borg, he had the chance to take home the match in the fourth set - which was settled in a historic tiebreak, which never wanted to end. None of the players were able to decide. There was a huge discharge of emotions, with both dream tennis and simple mistakes, which caused spectators to twist. Björn Borg had five match balls without being able to decide. The tiebreak was a 22-minute drama that was over first when McEnroe settled in his seventh set, to 18-16.

The crowd took to the forehead, after four hours of high octane tennis it would be a fifth and decisive set. Björn Borg acknowledged much later, in an interview with the British newspaper Observer 2007, that the walk back to his chair after the loss in the fourth set was a nightmare.

"That was my hardest moment in my career, that walk to the chair," he said.

So five times Borg had had the chance to puncture the match, but failed. In his memoirs, he described the feeling for the fifth set: “I thought I would lose this game now. Now I ignore this. I have tried but now the air has gone out of me ”.

McEnroe had been tired but was now full of confidence. He was lifted by the drama, had momentum, and later described in his own biography how he was convinced to win; "I was completely safe, absolutely safe."

The fifth set began with Borg almost losing his own servegame. But then he took over - despite the previous mental collapse. Suddenly Björn Borg played his life's tennis. McEnroe was bad in every game. "What he had inside was something I could never understand," the American describes in his book. "I thought the guy has four titles, that's not enough, isn't it?" Björn Borg lost just three points in his own serve and won the last set with 8-6. The master of long five-eaters had done it again. When the match ball was won, Bengt Grive erupted, directly in SVT:

- I don't think that's true! It's incredible, he's done it again! Björn Borg, our greatest athlete ever ...

Most people who saw the drama still remember it. The rivalry was so great, so deep in the history of tennis.