Anke Huber

Anke Huber

Anke Huber spent her career as the second-best German in an era when the best German was Steffi Graf. She recognised early, she said, that she would never match Graf's success, yet was always measured against her. The closest she came to a major was the 1996 Australian Open final, where Monica Seles, winning her first Slam since the 1993 stabbing, was too strong, 6-4, 6-1. A Roland Garros semifinalist in 1993 at eighteen, Huber reached the last four in Melbourne again in 1998.

She pushed Graf hardest at the 1995 WTA Championships, where the Madison Square Garden final went the distance, 6-3 in the fifth to Graf, only the second five-set final in the event's history. Huber won the Fed Cup with Germany in 1992, peaked at No. 4 in October 1996 and collected 12 career titles before an ankle injury ended the run in 2001, at 26. She stayed in the sport, running the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix, the German indoor event she used to play.