{"id":4784,"date":"2023-01-18T02:15:30","date_gmt":"2023-01-18T02:15:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/sport\/arthur-ashe-how-the-former-australian-open-champion-impacted-nigerian-tennis\/"},"modified":"2023-01-18T02:15:31","modified_gmt":"2023-01-18T02:15:31","slug":"arthur-ashe-how-the-former-australian-open-champion-impacted-nigerian-tennis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/sport\/arthur-ashe-how-the-former-australian-open-champion-impacted-nigerian-tennis\/","title":{"rendered":"Arthur Ashe: How the former Australian Open champion impacted Nigerian tennis"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Ashe was the reigning Wimbledon singles champion at the time of the attempted coup on his visit to Nigeria in 1976<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In February 1976, Arthur Ashe – three-time Grand Slam singles champion, including the 1970 Australian Open – and some of his contemporaries cheerfully jetted off to Nigeria to participate in the Lagos Tennis Classic.<\/span><\/p>\n

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A week later, they were forced off the court at gunpoint – and were soon fleeing the country for their lives.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Ashe was the most famous member of the group that had flown to Africa for the Lagos-based round of the World Championship of Tennis (WCT), which had a $60,000 prize fund courtesy of business tycoon Olatunji Ajisomo Alabi – popularly known as Lord Rumens.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ashe was the reigning Wimbledon singles champion, but also on the trip were Tom Okker, Dick Crealy, Jeff Borowiak and Brian Fairlie.<\/span><\/p>\n

The tournament’s big claim at the time was that it was the first of its kind in black Africa.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coincidentally, Brazilian football icon Pele was also in Nigeria that February on an ambassadorial tour sponsored by Pepsi.<\/span><\/p>\n

The director of Nigeria’s International Tennis Academy, Godwin Kienka, remembers it as a great moment for lovers of sport in the country.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Arthur Ashe was as famous as Pele was in football. It was auspicious,” he recalled.<\/span><\/p>\n

“It just happened that two great sportsmen were in the country at the same time.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Forced off court<\/h3>\n
\"Murtala<\/span><\/span>
General Murtala Mohammed’s assassination was the trigger for the crisis that unfolded<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The tournament at the Lagos Lawn Tennis Club (LLTC) had passed off without a hitch until Friday 13 February, the fourth day of the Open.<\/span><\/p>\n

That was the day General Murtala Mohammed, the Nigerian head of state, was assassinated whilst on his way to work in Lagos as part of a military coup attempt .<\/span><\/p>\n

Nonetheless, the organisers of the tournament – led by John McDonald, international director of the WCT – pushed for the tournament to continue, despite the chaos that began to envelop the country.<\/span><\/p>\n