Tennis: "So, what is your legacy?" 36-year-old Andre Agassi was asked, having finally decided to play for the last time at Wimbledon and make this summer's US Open his final professional tournament.

"I don't know. I look forward to reading about that," replied the only current player to have won all four Grand Slam titles and only the fifth in history to do so.

Agassi's relationship with the media has always been fraught, though in recent years the wisdom and presidential weight he has brought to his interviews have been a counterpoint to many of the confused notions and ideas the younger generation of players bring to such gatherings.

But given this is the man who dated the singer Barbra Streisand, married and divorced the actor Brook Shields and set up family with arguably the greatest player in the history of tennis, Steffi Graf, you could reasonably say Agassi had the attention coming.

The rancour of his early years was also at odds with the Wimbledon traditions, against which he rebelled as a teenager between 1987 and 1991. For those years Agassi, immature and petulant, refused to travel to England and compete in the greatest tournament in the world.

Back then, the bottle-blond hair and candy-coloured latex shorts said as much as you wanted to know about him. But when he decided to play in 1991 and won the title in 1992 for the only time in 13 visits, the punk was smitten.

Ironically, the championship he hated kick-started a Grand Slam run as he swept through the game in the 1990s, picking up the US Open in 1994, the Australian Open in 1995 and finally the French Open in 1999.

This year the father of two, who sacrificed the clay-court season just to haul his complaining body to London in good-enough shape to provide a threat, hopes to make ripples. Last year he departed with a chronic back injury that threatened to terminate his career before any lap of honour could be contemplated.

But Agassi has been nothing if not a perfectionist. He famously brings a towel with him after matches to place on tables and chairs so as not to put sweat on the surfaces. Before one interview in the USA, having carefully placed a towel on a table before the post-match interview began, Agassi stared in horror at a journalist who had decided at that moment to pick at his feet.

"Stop doing that," he said in disgust. "Would you do that at home?"

His choreography with ball boys has also been a side drama to every match. Agassi insists all balls are with a particular youngster. If the little helpers fail to follow his explicit instructions to have the balls in his specified corner, he gently lectures them and stops play until they get it right. It must be right.

Behind every great player you will find some characteristics of the obsessive, and it is that which has allowed Agassi return this year and be competitive.

Though he lost to Tim Henman in the first round of the Queens event before Wimbledon and is short of match practice, he never arrives unless he believes he has a shot.

"This is where it all started for me, my dreams," he says. "It really started here. I wanted to make sure I made the right decisions to get myself ready for this championship. This championship has allowed me to grow into the player and person I am today."

For now, Agassi will be longing for a run to at least the third round, and his first match, against Serbia's Boris Pashanski, could mark the opening of the gate into an interesting mini-event within the draw through the first week.

What the television stations and fans are quietly hoping for is a third-round meeting between the American and the 20-year-old Spanish Roland Garros champion, Rafael Nadal.

It would be the past shaking hands with the future: two great fetchers of the ball, two battling players who never lie down, and a respectable challenge for a likely last match for Agassi.

"Yeah, I guess that could happen," he says. "Nadal has just been great for the game. It's great to see him and Roger have the rivalry they have and the interest they have created around the world. I would look forward to that challenge for sure."

Even Roger Federer has tugged a forelock to the Las Vegan's durability and profile, remarking it would "not be pleasant" for tennis to "lose a big legend of the game and one of the colourful personalities".

"So what is your legacy?" Agassi was asked again on the BBC as the rain poured down on the covered courts yesterday.

"I don't know how to answer that," he said, again avoiding an answer, the doe eyes staring into the middle distance.