Jana Novotna: The Wimbledon champion who turned heartbreak into one of tennis’ greatest careers

Czech Jana Novotna’s victory over Natalie Tauziat in the 1998 Wimbledon final sparked a huge outpouring of joy across the tennis community. This was in part to how well liked the affable Czech was, but also to earn redemption after two previous final losses, one of which was from a great position of strength, at the hallowed All England Club.

A leading singles player throughout the 1990s. Novotna established a great legacy in doubles by winning twelve women's doubles majors and a further four in the mixed discipline.

Novotna was born on 2nd October, 1968 in Brno to parents Frantisek and Libuse. Novotna has a brother called Pavol. She turned professional in 1987.

Novotna’s debut season yielded three doubles titles and a maiden singles final appearance in Brisbane. The 1988 campaign was illuminated by mixed doubles Grand Slam triumphs in tandem with American Jim Pugh at the Australian and US Opens. She also added a singles title and five doubles titles during the campaign.

Novotna made her Olympic debut representing Czechoslovakia at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul. Playing with Helena Sukova, they returned home with a bronze medal after a narrow win in the playoff over Pam Shriver and Zina Garrison of the USA.

A first women's doubles Grand Slam materialised for Novotna, partnered by Sukova, when they defeated Larisa Neiland and Natasha Zvereva to lift the Wimbledon title.

Novotna doubled her mixed tally in the majors by winning alongside Pugh at the Australian Open and Wimbledon. These would be the last of her mixed doubles Grand Slam victories.

Her 1989 campaign saw Novotna advance to a major singles quarter-final for the first time. She pocketed a singles title in Strasbourg and claimed six in doubles with Sukova.

Novotna and Sukova came up just short in their efforts to achieve a Calendar Year Grand Slam. They lifted the Australian Open (def Party Fendick and Mary Joe Fernandez), a first French Open (def Neiland/Zvereva) and retained their Wimbledon crown (def Kathy Jordan and Liz Smylie).

Hopes of a clean sweep were dashed in the US Open final when losing in straight sets to Gigi Fernandez and Martina Navratilova, two fellow greats.

Novotna added a third singles title in 1990 and made a first singles semi at a major (Roland Garros). She lifted ten doubles titles across the season.

Novotna’s standing in the singles went up a notch after she reached her first major singles final at the 1991 Australian Open. She lost in three sets to teenage sensation Monica Seles. She lifted two singles titles this year.

Novotna continued to feature regularly at the business end of the major doubles competitions. After her treble of 1990, Novotna featured in all four women's doubles finals the following year. She only converted, playing with Gigi Fernandez, one of these into another title. The duo won the French Open but lost in Australia and England. While the US Open final was lost in unison with Neiland.

The 1992 season saw herself and Neiland lose both the French Open and Wimbledon finals to the now dominant pair of Gigi Fernandez and Zvereva. The Czech picked up six doubles titles during the campaign.

Novotna’s season in singles was a difficult one, failing to progress beyond round four in any of the majors and not lifting any silverware.

In a match that has gone down as one of Wimbledon’s iconic finals, Novotna suffered a collapse that left her crying on the shoulder of The Duchess of Kent. Leading 4-1 in the deciding set, and within a point of 5-1, the prospect of her greatest hour overwhelmed her and she lost the set 6-4. Her emotional distress afterwards captured the hearts of many and instigated a desire among the tennis community for her to have a redemption arc.

Novotna lost two Grand Slam finals in doubles this term, including at Wimbledon. She amassed two WTA singles titles and five doubles titles but was now developing a reputation for losing major finals.

Novotna ended her losing streak of seven major doubles finals when herself and new partner, Aranxta Sanchez-Vicario, defeated Katerina Maleeva and Robin White to lift the 1994 US Open crown.

Five titles were accrued this year in tandem with Sanchez-Vicario and she took part in a trophy lift on a trio of occasions in singles.

The 1995 season witnessed Novotna and Sanchez-Vicario challenge the supremacy of Gigi Fernandez and Zvereva. The Czech/Spanish pair beat them in both the Australian Open and Wimbledon finals, either side of a final loss at Roland Garros.

Novotna reached the semis at Wimbledon and lifted a singles title in Linz. Seven doubles titles were added including the season-ending Tour Championships.

Novotna had her best singles campaign to date in 1996, bagging four titles. She made the semis in Paris and the last eight of the year's final two majors. Six doubles titles were harvested, four with Sanchez-Vicario, but no major glory was part of the sextet.

Novotna returned to the Wimbledon singles final in 1997 but was swept aside by the Swiss starlet Martina Hingis, who was just 16. Earlier in the year, Novotna had partnered Hingis to a doubles success in Paris.

The Brno native lifted four singles titles culminating in her biggest singles title to date at the WTA Tour Championships in New York. It was a season that also returned five doubles titles, including the US Open, alongside new partner Lindsay Davenport.

Novotna dropped just one set en route to advancing into a third Wimbledon singles showpiece. She knocked out Venus Williams in the last eight before winning a repeat of last year's final against Hingis.

In the title match, Novotna needed just two sets to defeat French grass court specialist Natalie Tauziat. The emotion came pouring out of Novotna as five years on from tears of sadness on Centre Court, she now was crying tears of joy and relief.

To add further gloss to this cathartic triumph, Novotna added the doubles title alongside Hingis. They won three of the four majors together that year, triumphing together in Paris and New York, too.

Novotna lifted four singles titles and six doubles titles in a 1998 campaign that would be the last in terms of winning majors for the ever popular Czech.

Her final season on tour, in 1999, saw Novotna add a final singles title in Germany and three more doubles titles. The last of these came at the Canadian Open in Toronto.

When she retired at the end of the last millennium, Novotna had amassed 24 singles titles, from 40 finals, 76 women's doubles titles, from 126 finals, and four mixed doubles titles.

Her highest singles ranking was two and one in doubles. She finished year-end top ten seven times and in her last season was still ranked three at the season's close. Novotna ended in the top ten of the doubles rankings for ten consecutive seasons, nine of which were in the top five. She ended the 1991 campaign at world number one.

Novotna played in the 1988 Fed Cup victory for the Czechs over the Soviet Union. She partnered Petr Korda for the newly independent Czech Republic to Hopman Cup glory in 1994.

Novotna’s retirement came as something of a surprise but her serve and volley style of play was sadly falling out of favour. She was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2005.

Novotna was part of the BBC’s Radio coverage at Wimbledon for many years after her retirement.

A crowd favourite, Novotna continued to play in the fun environment of invitational doubles at Wimbledon, emerging triumphant on five occasions. She sometimes played with Navratilova and helped the American legend with a cancer battle in 2010.

Coaching was a vocation she enjoyed, working with players such as compatriot Barbora Krejcikova. Novotna was in a long-term relationship with former Polish professional Iwona Kuczynska. Novotna had resided in Florida until 2010, before opting to return home and live in the village of Omice, near Brno, with her partner.

Tragically, their life together was cut short when Novotna passed away at the young age of 49 from ovarian cancer in November 2017. She'd kept the news private apart from a very close inner circle of friends and family. Her career served up a Wimbledon singles title that caused such joy through the tennis family. Her story is one of redemption and a style of play which she kept in the spotlight as it became less fashionable. Her doubles record is one of the best ever in the Open Era. Her life was cruelly cut short, but the memories and how she made me people feel live on.