When is a grand slam a grand slam? Only when it is achieved, purists would argue, in the same calendar year. Three legs of Martina Navratilova's - then only the third to have been recorded in women's tennis - came in 1983, the fourth in the French Open in 1984. And, although she was rewarded with a $1m (£700,000) cheque by the International Tennis Federation for her feat, even the the ITF's records still fail to recognise it as a legitimate slam.
Whether this is a precedent which would or indeed should apply to Tiger Woods, were he to match Navratilova in golf's potentially equivalent scenario at the Masters, remains to be seen. But it is likely Woods would be embroiled in much the same controversy that surrounded Navratilova.
Navratilova has admitted she found the lack of recognition hurtful, especially as after Paris she went on to retain her Wimbledon and US Open titles to register a record-equalling six grand slam titles in a row. In an interview in Rome in 1995 she understandably inquired: "I had all four major titles in my keeping and all had been won in a 12-months period. What possible difference did it make that I didn't win them in the same calendar year?" What indeed?
Much of the curiously bitter opposition to her slam being recognised came from the American press, many of whom felt the Czech defector was not strictly "one of us". But would they have used the same argument had it been Billie Jean King or Chris Evert?
Nevertheless she was happy in the knowledge that she had had the game's four greatest prizes under her belt at the same time. Only three living players can say the same: Rod Laver, who did the slam as an amateur in 1962 and again as a professional in 1969; his fellow Australian Margaret Court in 1970; and Steffi Graf in 1988. Before them only Donald Budge (1938) and Maureen Connolly (1953) could make that claim.
Navratilova's "slam" was unique in two ways. She is and will remain the only player, female or male, to win two of the four majors on grass, with the others coming on clay and hard courts; the US Open was then on grass and subsequently the Australian too has switched to hard courts. And in completing 27 straight victories she recorded six more than Connolly and four more than Court, her so-called legitimate grand slam predecessors.
It could also be argued, as some did at the time, that the sequence that brought the Navratilova "slam" was the hardest possible for her, culminating as it did in a fourth leg at Roland Garros on her worst surface and faced by her toughest opponent, Evert, in the final.
Though seeded No1, Navratilova, who had managed to avoid most of the clay-court specialists on the way to the final, was anything but a tipster's favourite at the start. After all, she had lost all but one of her previous eight matches on clay against an opponent recognised as the greatest specialist ever.
Evert, or Mrs Lloyd as she was then, must have felt confident of claiming a sixth Paris title. Instead she was swept aside 6-3, 6-1 in little more than an hour.
At times Navratilova was awesome and even Ted Tinling and Dan Maskell, two of the sport's keenest observers for over 60 years, agreed that they had never seen a woman play better - "not even Suzanne Lenglen in her prime".
Earlier Navratilova had stopped Andrea Jaeger in the Wimbledon final, where she dropped only 25 games; Evert in the US Open, where she again won every round in straight sets; and Kathy Jordan in the Australian, where the only player to win a set off her was Britain's Jo Durie.
Navratilova just kept on winning, taking further crowns in 1984 at Wimbledon and Flushing Meadows on the way to a record- breaking 74 victories. She finally lost to the 19-year-old Czechoslovak Helena Sukova in the semi-final of the Australian Open.
Martina Navratilova may have lost out in one respect but of whom else could it be said, as Billie Jean King once did, "all eras have their great players but Martina straddles every era as the greatest"? Some day the same may be said of Tiger Woods - grand slam or no grand slam.
