After last year’s postponement of the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games we are promised a Paralympic Tennis Event like no other between 27 August and 4 September, when history will be made, records will likely be set and talking points aplenty are guaranteed.

So, as we prepare for the drama that will unfold at the Ariake Tennis Park, it’s well worth revisiting two outstanding moments from previous Paralympic Tennis Events and start by looking at two of the players who stand out on the Tokyo entry list.

Tokyo’s oldest and youngest wheelchair tennis players

Martin Legner’s place in Paralympic history has long been established. The only player to have contested all seven Paralympic Tennis Events when he lined up in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, the Austrian is set to make his eighth Games appearance in Tokyo, where, just over three months short of his 60th birthday, he will also be the oldest wheelchair tennis player by a margin of two years.

“If I could get to Tokyo it would be great. Just to get through the qualification would mean a lot,” Legner told the ITF in April 2020, before the postponement of the Games. With just three years until Paris 2024, could Legner make it to Paris?

“I’ve been asked how long I might continue playing ever since my first Paralympics in Barcelona. I want to play for as long as I like it and I enjoy it. That’s the answer I gave then and the answer will always be the same,” says the former world No. 3, who has contested two bronze medal matches, one in singles and the other in doubles, without yet managing to earn a place on the podium.

“Every Paralympics was special, but my best Paralympics was Sydney. In Barcelona, I got the fourth place in doubles and in Sydney I got the fourth place in singles,” recalls Legner.

“The atmosphere in Sydney was great, with all the people around, it was the one I enjoyed most,” he adds. “London was also exciting for me in terms of having so many people around. That was unbelievable for me that the interest was so big for the Paralympics.”

Born more than 10 years after the first Paralympic Tennis Event to have full medal status in 1992, Niels Vink will be the youngest wheelchair tennis player in Tokyo, aged 18.

“I’m very excited, four years ago it was only a dream to the play at the Paralympics, but now it’s going to happen,” says Vink, who became the youngest winner of a Super Series quad singles title when he made his British Open debut aged 16 in 2019.

With Vink having added to his Super Series tally this season, made his Grand Slam debut at the Australian Open and recently made his debut inside the top four in the quad singles world rankings, earning a medal at his first Paralympics is certainly not beyond the realms of possibility, but the young Dutchman is only thinking about his performance.

‘No, I’ve not thought about being on the podium,” he says. “I’ll focus on my performance and then we’ll see what’s happening. It would be a dream (to win a medal).”

“I’m just very, very happy and we’ll see where it takes me. The Australian Open was a big event for me and I enjoyed everything,” he adds. “Now in Tokyo I can again enjoy everything, but also play my best tennis, hopefully. I’ve beaten every player in the Top 5 apart from Dylan (Alcott), so if I have a good day then it could happen.”

The longest match in Paralympic Tennis history

While hot weather is expected in Tokyo, it remains to be seen if temperatures approach the 40-degree heat in which the longest match in the history of the Paralympic Tennis Event was played in Rio in 2016.

It was a contest that saw Great Britain’s Jamie Burdekin and Andy Lapthorne claim the quad doubles bronze medal after beating Israel’s Itay Erenlib and Shraga Weinberg 3-6, 6-4, 7-6(2) in four hours and 25 minutes.

“This lad here (hugging Lapthorne) talked me all the way through it, so a massive credit to him – my hat goes off to the kid – because there was so many down points in the match,” said Burdekin in the wake of the marathon contest.

“I almost died in the first set; the conditions were burning but they kept bringing ice and water and I felt much better after we won the second," he added. "I didn’t play my best tennis but I played some big shots when it counted, especially the drop shot to get match point in the tie-break.”

“There were some quite long breaks in there (in between sets) because it was very hot. To play in the middle of the day for a medal or you go home with nothing was very tough,” Lapthorne recalled recently.

“I played a lot of my matches at night during Rio, so to play that one during the day when it was so hot and to play against two guys who were not missing many balls and having left the tennis centre between 2.00am and 3.00am the night before after winning my singles semi-final, it becomes more of a mental battle than it does a physical battle at that point.

“I remember playing a really good tie-break at the end and hitting the last forehand down the middle of the Israeli team and I think you could see afterwards how much it meant to me,” added the Rio quad singles silver medallist.

The most dramatic tennis match in Paralympic history?

While the longest wheelchair tennis match in Paralympic history is a measurable fact, subjectivity will always come into a discussion about which was the most dramatic match. But put into the context in which it occurred, the women’s singles gold medal match at Beijing in 2008 has plenty to recommend it.

In Beijing, world No.1 Esther Vergeer’s hitherto perfect Paralympic record and seven-year unbeaten streak was put under the most intense scrutiny by countrywoman Korie Homan.

Having led the final by a set and a break, Vergeer lost the second set and Homan went 5-3 up in the decider and earned match point. The wheelchair tennis and Paralympic family held its breath, but Vergeer held her nerve and collected the third of her four singles gold medals.

“To come back to win from that point, given all the pressure and tension, it was probably the pinnacle of my career,” said Vergeer.

“Afterwards, the emotions were very intense for both of us because I had managed to win from a very difficult position and she had just missed out on winning gold and beating me for the first time in the process.

“That one match summed up the beauty of competition because while the two of you are almost enemies on the court you can end up sharing intense emotions that you will never forget,” added Vergeer, who is set to be in Tokyo as Chef de Mission for the Dutch Paralympic Team.

As things would transpire, the day after the drama of her Beijing singles final, Vergeer experienced her only loss in Paralympic competition when Homan and Sharon Walraven beat Vergeer and Jiske Griffioen to the women’s doubles gold medal.

However, Vergeer would crown her legendary career as a player in London four years later, becoming the most decorated Paralympic tennis player of all time after winning her seventh and eight Paralympic medals.

In the process she also set another record for the fewest number of games dropped on the way to a Paralympic singles gold medal, relinquishing just seven games in five matches and securing seven sets by a margin of 6-0 on her way to finishing on top of the podium for a seventh time.