Rod Laver wishes he was in Melbourne for some other reason than the 50th anniversary of his victory in the 1962 Australian men’s singles championship.

“Boy, 50 years is a long time ago,” Laver said.

“What happened to 30 and 40.”

The significance of that 1962 victory is that it was the first leg of the first of Laver’s two grand slams, the second of which came seven years later.

The Australian Open that year was played at the White City stadium in Sydney when Laver was 23.

Despite the five decades since, he has no trouble recalling the details of that match or the subsequent finals of the French, Wimbledon and US championships that made up the grand slam.

“A flood of memories comes back,” Laver said.

Particularly when he ran into the man he beat in three of those finals, fellow Australian Roy Emerson from the US where they both live.

“He reminded me of some of the things that happened in those matches, those things immediately come back,” he said.

Laver, who suffered a stroke in 1998, recalled the ’62 French final in particular.

“I didn’t have an easy match with Emerson – he led two sets to one and 4-1,” he said.

“I was just honoured to be able to pull it off.

“You don’t start off trying to win the grand slam. You’re just very happy to play the matches, the tournaments.

“The thrill of going to the French championships, Wimbledon, US Open.”

While Laver was the second man to win the grand slam after the American Don Budge in 1938, he is the only player to have done it twice, and therefore the only one who can compare the two achievements.

“I would say the toughest was probably the first, but the most satisfying was probably the second,” he said.

“Probably because all the players in the world – (Lew) Hoad, (Ken) Rosewall, (Pancho) Gonzales – were playing the second time.”

For Laver, though, there is one thing in the tennis world that surpasses his two grand slams and that is having the centre court at Melbourne’s National Tennis Centre named in his honour.

“The main thing is just being back here and seeing the name on this unbelievable stadium,” he said.

“I think it’s the crowning jewel of my whole career is seeing the stadium lit up.”

Laver is one of several former Australian Open winners who are also in Melbourne for the 100th staging of the championships.