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John McEnroe married a rock star—one of his most memorable moments on court came when he played a rock star.

Bjorn Borg is not a musician, but McEnroe recalls the reaction Borg evoked walking through the grounds at Wimbledon as a hysteria similar to Beatlemania.

Watch: Battle of the Sexes Trailer 

"It was amazing. It was like a combination of Elvis and the Beatles," McEnroe told The Boston Globe of the reception Borg received at Wimbledon. "Never before have I seen Wimbledon like that. It’s never happened before and it’s never happened since."

Fans can relive the famed Fire and Ice rivalry with the release of the new Borg-McEnroe feature film on September 15th, 2017.

See the trailer for the movie above.

Swedish actor Sverrir Gudnason is cast as Swedish Iceman Borg and bears a striking resemblance to the former world No. 1.

Shia LaBeouf, who plays McEnroe, has called Borg and McEnroe "extraordinary men in an extraordinary situation" and said he sees the iconic rivalry as "a masculine love story."

Here's how the actors stack up to the champions.


The classic 1980 Wimbledon final in which Borg fought off McEnroe remains one of the highest-quality clashes in Wimbledon history.

The mercurial McEnroe fought off five match points to win that fourth-set tiebreaker (he saved seven match points in the fourth set overall), but Borg’s brilliance in the fifth set saw the stoic Swede earn a 1-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-7 (16), 8-6 victory to capture his fifth consecutive Wimbledon crown.

"You had two different personalities," Borg said. "I come from Sweden, where our mentality is a little laid-back, a little more quiet. John grew up outside New York and he’s a little bit more outspoken."

Here's what McEnroe has to say about the film:


In past interviews, Borg has revealed so many fans are fixated on McEnroe’s match-point saving heroics in the fourth set, they often forget Borg came back to win the match. "I never correct them," Borg said of fans, who forget he won the championship.

"People come up to me quite often and say: ‘That tiebreak was incredible tennis. Amazing. You played so well, it’s a shame you lost it,’ " Borg said. "They remember that fourth-set tiebreaker so well that many people forget I came back to win the fifth. I never correct them.

"You know, people talk about how focused I was to come back and win the fifth set, but walking to my chair after losing the fourth set tiebreaker, I was very, very disappointed. I thought I had just lost the match. It has to be one of the best matches I have ever played at Wimbledon. I thought after I lost the fourth set, I would lose the match. I was exhausted, especially after all those match points, but I didn’t give up."

Photo credit: International Tennis Hall of Fame

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