EIMEAR RYAN: John McEnroe, you cannot be serious

I am mostly aware of John McEnroe as a meme, says Eimear Ryan. I don’t remember watching him play in his heyday; by the time I was conscious of Wimbledon it was Graf, Agassi, Sampras and Navratilova who ruled the courts. 

But like many YouTube viewers, I know McEnroe as the ‘You cannot be serious!’ guy. One of tennis’s all-time greats, McEnroe is nonetheless most famous for his conduct at Wimbledon in 1981. Enraged at certain decisions that didn’t go his way, he yelled ‘You cannot be serious!’ repeatedly at the umpires — who were presumably too British, polite and bewildered to respond in kind.

This is the kind of guy McEnroe is — stubborn, arrogant, controversial. (Though in fairness, he has a bit of self-awareness and self-effacing humour about him. Not only did he call his autobiography You Cannot Be Serious, he has gamely spouted his catchphrase in everything from car adverts to the sitcom 30 Rock.)