Jannik Sinner won the 2024 Australian Open, his first Major triumph, as he took down the now three-time losing finalist Daniil Medvedev in five sets.

Novak Djokovic lost to Sinner at the Australian Open this year and will be looking to get revenge this time around with his new coach Andy Murray, as he looks to add to his record 24 Grand Slam titles.

Similarly, Carlos Alcaraz will be looking to take home his first title down under, as he has the opportunity to complete the Career Grand Slam in Melbourne.

Several stars will want to write their name into the history books but are unlikely to do what one ATP legend achieved back in the 1980s.

Johan Kriek: The man who won two consecutive Australian Open titles under different nationalities

In 1981, Africa’s wait for a Grand Slam champion in the Open Era finally came to an end as South Africa’s Johan Kriek lifted the Australian Open title aloft.

Seeded fourth at the tournament he advanced to the third round without dropping a set before coming up against his toughest test yet against his first-seeded opponent.

Kriek took the first two sets against New Zealand’s Christopher Lewis before the Kiwi battled back to take things to a decider.

The South African clinched the match in the fifth set, not dropping another set on his way to the final in Melbourne.

His opponent in the final was American Steve Denton, whom he defeated in four sets to claim his and Africa’s first Grand Slam title.

The men’s final actually took place on January 3, 1982, making what happened next all the more extraordinary.

Whilst Kriek was born in Pongola, South Africa, he lived in America for a significant period of time during the 1970s and 80s and became a naturalized American citizen in August 1982.

This meant that when he turned up to defend his title in November’s Australian Open, he was doing so under a different nationality to the one he had won the title with the year prior.

South African or American, it didn’t matter for Kriek, as he reached the semi-finals in 1982 without too much hassle.

He did encounter a problem in the last four, however, as home-favorite Paul McNamee took him to five sets, before Kriek advanced to the final for the second year running.

Once again, he came up against Denton, this time his countryman, as he won in straight sets to clinch his second Australian Open title.

Doing so he accomplished several impressive feats that others are unlikely to repeat.

• Became the first African Grand Slam champion in the Open Era
• Became the first player to defend a Grand Slam title under a different nationality
• Became the first player to defend a Grand Slam title in the same calendar year that he won the title

Kriek didn’t win another Major title after his triumphs in 1981 and 1982, but he did reach the semi-finals in Australia once more in 1984, and at the French Open in 1986.

The South African-turned-American reached a career-high of seventh in the world before retiring from tennis in 1994.

Have any other African tennis players won Grand Slam titles?

No other African has won a Major title since Kriek’s success in 1981, but there was actually a Grand Slam winner prior to the South African.

Back in the amateur era of men’s tennis, Egyptian star Jaroslav Drobny took home the 1951 and 1952 French Open titles, before picking up a third Slam at Wimbledon in 1954.

Drobny’s story is one that deserves a documentary or film all on its own as he himself changed nationalities but in a much more dramatic fashion.

Born in Czechoslovakia, he played both Ice hockey and tennis, and he quickly became one of the biggest sporting stars of his nation.

He remarkably won the World Championships in Ice hockey with Czechoslovakia before picking up an Olympic Silver Medal in 1948.

However, in 1949 after the Czechoslovakian coup, Drobny defected from the nation becoming stateless.

He did so with very little to his name, which he revealed later on in his career.

“All I had was a couple of shirts, the proverbial toothbrush, and $50,” said Drobny.

A man without a country, Drobny attempted to receive citizenship in several countries, including Switzerland, the USA, and Australia, before Egypt finally took him in.

It was as an Egyptian that Drobny achieved the most success on the tennis court, as he won three Grand Slam titles.

The most impressive of which came at Wimbledon in 1954, as Drobny took down a young Ken Rosewall in a tense four-set battle.

He was a popular winner on centre-court, at the tournament which became somewhat of a second home to the Egyptian.

It did become his home just a few short years later, as Drobny changed nationalities once more, gaining British citizenship in 1959.

He never won Wimbledon or any other Grand Slam title as a British citizen, but what he did during his nine years as an Egyptian was more than enough to cement his legacy in African and world tennis forever.

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