To celebrate TENNIS Magazine’s 40th anniversary, we’ve chosen the 40 best players of the last four decades. Here are numbers 40 through 37.

40. Gabriela Sabatini
Photo by Michael Cole

 If athletes are indeed entertainers, then the impact of Gabriela Sabatini’s career can’t be measured in wins and losses. From the time she broke through to the semifinals of Roland Garros as a 15-year-old in 1985 until she retired in 1996, there was no greater attraction than the player known simply as “Gaby.” Sabatini’s dark eyes and engaging smile won hearts around the world. But it was her flashy one-handed topspin backhand and innate court sense that had her on tour by age 14. At that point, it was a question not of when she would win a major, but of how many. Over the years, though, the challenge of competing against the likes of Martina Navratilova, Steffi Graf, and Monica Seles proved too daunting.

Sabatini won her first and only Slam in 1990, when she imposed her attacking game on Graf in the U.S. Open final. The Argentine would go on to play her best tennis in the early ’90s, at one point winning seven of eight from Graf. The lone loss came in Sabatini’s last major final, at Wimbledon in 1991.

In that entertaining match, Sabatini served for the title twice, only to lose 8-6 in the third. The defeat was emblematic: Sabatini was a game competitor, but she often squandered her chances. Still, she reached No. 3 in the world and made the semifinals or better at majors 18 times. Her consistency was as striking as the appealing image that won Gaby her ardent fans. — JON LEVEY

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
> 1990 U.S. Open title
> 27 WTA singles titles
> Winner of 1988 and ’94 year-end WTA Championships

39. Patrick Rafter
Photo By Michael Cole

Of all the game’s greatest players, Patrick Rafter may have been the least likely and the best liked. The seventh of nine children, Rafter turned pro at 19 in 1991, but it wasn’t until 1993 that he won the ATP’s Newcomer of the Year award. In between, he paid his dues on the Challenger circuit, a place unknown to most of the game’s elite. By 1997, Rafter still hadn’t reached the quarterfinals of a major. But everything changed that year, as he leapt to No. 2, won the U.S. Open, and, just as impressively, served-and-volleyed his way to the French Open semifinals. Then again, Rafter’s serve-and-volley game was less a style of play than an athletic art form. His nasty kick serve bounced up high, and his astoundingly quick feet put him right on top of the net. Rafter’s hands were even quicker—the image that lingers is of him lunging at full stretch to cut off a passing shot and punch it away for a winner.

It’s a picture Andre Agassi won’t forget. His five-set wars with Rafter were some of the best of recent years. But it’s a mark of the respect Rafter inspired that even one of his greatest rivals urged him not to call it quits in 2001. “He’s a true competitor, true champion, a first-class person off the court,” Agassi said. “The game will miss him when he goes.” —STEPHEN TIGNOR

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
> 1997 and ’98 U.S. Open titles; reached Wimbledon final twice
> Became 17th man to hold No. 1 ranking on ATP computer, in July 1999

38. Virgina Wade
Photo By Tommy Hindley

You could almost hear a groan rise over Great Britain when, on the eve of Wimbledon in 1977, England’s Virginia Wade vowed, “I’m not going to fold this time.” But after making that remark, Wade slashed her way to the title and made Wimbledon’s Centenary celebration a truly unforgettable one for her country.

The moment Wade won Wimbledon was as improbable as it was wonderful. By then she was almost 32 and prone to collapsing under the British public’s expectations. But Wade already knew something about rising to one-off occasions. Nine years earlier, she had won at her hometown of Bournemouth, in the very first tournament of the new Open era. An amateur at the time, she relinquished her status in time to keep a $6,000 champion’s check that she earned just months later, when she won the first U.S. Open. Raised in South Africa, Wade was a lean and athletic serve-and-volleyer. She was also durable, competing in major events over an astonishing 23-year career that ended at Wimbledon in 1985. By then, she’d won more Open era singles titles (55) than all but six players.

Moody and ever inclined to attack, the dark-haired vicar’s daughter loved to pounce on a short ball. She was often described as a “tigress” despite the bouts of self-doubt that helped keep her from winning more than three major singles titles.

But those widely chronicled struggles with confidence helped make Wade’s Wimbledon win of 1977 an event that transfixed a nation. With one swipe of her Dunlop Maxply, Wade temporarily wiped away the charge that the British were better at inventing and popularizing games than playing them. Are you listening, Tim Henman? — PETER BODO

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
> 1968 U.S. Open, ’72 Australian Open, ’77 Wimbledon titles
> Ranked in Top 10 for 13 straight years > Won 839 matches, fourth most in Open era

37. Gustavo Kuerten
Photo By Clive Brunskill/Getty Images

Guga, as he’s affectionately known, wears a perpetual smile and sports unkempt reddish-brown hair that makes you wonder if he just rolled out of bed. When he walks, his 6-foot-3 body bounces like a marionette, arms and legs moving awkwardly, head bobbing up and down.

But the casual demeanor belies his intensity, for Kuerten is a master of the trench warfare called clay-court tennis. Throughout his career, he has used deft footwork, an underrated serve, and explosive ground strokes to maximum effect on the slow red clay of Europe and South America.

Although Kuerten will forever be linked with Roland Garros, where he’s a three-time champion, his defining moment came in 2000, on a fast indoor court in Lisbon, Portugal, at the Tennis Masters Cup. After almost pulling out of the event because of severe thigh spasms and back pain, he went on to beat Yevgeny Kafelnikov, Pete Sampras, and Andre Agassi in succession to win the year-end championships and become the first South American to finish the season No. 1.

“Guga has the vibrations,” says his coach, Larri Passos. “We come from Brazil and we need to play everything with our heart.” Guga illustrated that sentiment after winning his last French title. Using his racquet, he drew a giant heart in the clay to express his appreciation for the fans who’d supported him, Brazil’s lone Grand Slam champion. — JAMES MARTIN

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
> 1997, ’00, and ’01 Roland Garros titles
> Only man ever to beat Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi in final two rounds of a tournament (Lisbon 2000)