The Champions Wimbledon 1987

The Champions: Wimbledon 1987 (1987)
by John Parsons
Aurum Press
ISBN: 0948149728
Condition: Good (as sold by Crappy Old Books)

This is Wimbledon as it liked to see itself in 1987: pristine grass, crisp whites, polite applause, and the quiet implication that civilisation may actually be held together by strawberries, rain delays, and a well-timed backhand.

The Champions: Wimbledon 1987 is a glossy little time capsule from Aurum, documenting that year’s championships with the sort of photographic reverence normally reserved for royalty, steam engines, and cathedrals. It’s all here: the rituals, the theatre, the near-religious concentration, and the peculiar British ability to treat world-class athletic tension as something best observed with restrained facial expressions.

John Parsons does what this series does best: collects the story of the tournament into a handsome, browseable artefact that feels like it should live on a coffee table next to a decanter and a slightly guilty feeling that you never really understood tennis scoring but nodded along anyway. You can flip through it for the highlights, the drama, the champions, the moments of brilliance… and the occasional reminder that hair, rackets, and photo colour have all moved on in ways no one predicted.

Condition-wise, this copy is Good — it’s been enjoyed in the correct manner: opened, admired, revisited, and possibly used once or twice as evidence in an argument about whether “they don’t play like they used to.” It’s not pretending to be a shrink-wrapped museum piece; it’s a proper second-hand sports annual with a past and a purpose.

Perfect for:

• Wimbledon devotees and tennis nostalgists

• Sports book collectors

• Anyone building a shelf of “annuals that feel oddly prestigious”

• People who like their history served with centre-court polish and a faint hint of summer rain

Available now from Crappy Old Books — where even 1987 can still get a standing ovation.

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