Wimbledon star floors opponent with shot to the face and then laughs at him

Former Olympic silver medalist Tommy Haas was floored by a slicing backhand from Andre Sa in a gentlemen’s invitational doubles match on court 18 this afternoon at Wimbledon. The German legend was returning a rally close to the net when Sa clattered the ball into his face.

Luckily, Haas wasn’t hurt too badly and played up to the crowd with a theatrical flop as Sa burst out laughing. Unfortunately, though, Haas and his partner Mark Philippoussis went on to lose the legends game over three sets to Sa and Bruno Soares. 

During his professional career, Haas’ best performance at Wimbledon came in 2009 when he reached the semi-finals of the grasscourt Grand Slam before being dumped out of the tournament by eventual winner Roger Federer. But that wasn’t his proudest moment playing at the All England Lawn Tennis Club.

That came in 1998 when he defeated his idol Andre Agassi in a second-round clash. Haas recalls how he went from getting the American’s autograph six years earlier, when he won the single’s title, to playing against him on Centre Court.

“First time for me to play Andre Agassi, and I remember when he won Wimbledon in 1992, he was so pumped to win that match, and I got all the pictures and you know his signature,” Haas said.

“And you know, quick six years later, you know, me walking out there on Center Court playing, you know, literally one of my idols. It was like, wow, you know, I was very nervous and kind of like thinking to myself that I have finally arrived.

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“I want to play well. So you know, I know he didn’t place best match… and then there was getting late at night, so we had to come back the next day.

“And I heard that he flew in rackets,” he continued. “You know, for the next day for the next match to go play with a different racket. So lots of things, lots of drama going on.”

Haas played Agassi ten times during his career (6-4 Agassi) and that feeling never wore off. “I got many chances to play with Andre Agassi, got to go to a couple of tournaments with him when I was like, you know, 15, 16 years old,” he said. “So Andre to me was always one of my idols as well.

“You know, one of those guys that I that I looked up to. Loved his game still to this day. I think he’s one of the best strikers we ever had in the game.”

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