Godwin, whose father worked as a tennis coach, began playing tennis at the age of three. In 1991 he first appeared at the junior tournament at Wimbledon , but failed in the second round to Vincent Spadea . The following year he reached the quarter-finals there and was in the double-finals of the junior tournament of the French Open . In 1993 he took part in the double finals of the junior tournament of the French Open and Wimbledon and won the double title at the US Open Junior Championships .
In 1994 Godwin became a professional tennis player. He won his first title in 1996 at the side of Leander Paes at the Challenger tournament in Jerusalem . In the course of his career he was able to win a total of eleven Challenger double titles. He also got two Challenger individual titles. His greatest success on the ATP World Tour was winning the title at the tournament in Newport in 2001, after he had already been in the final there in 1998. In doubles he could not win any titles on the ATP World Tour, but reached a final three times. He achieved his highest ranking in the world rankings in 1997 with position 90 in singles and in 2000 with position 57 in doubles.
His best individual result in a Grand Slam tournament was reaching the round of 16 at Wimbledon 1996. There he benefited from victories against Cristiano Caratti and Grant Stafford from an injury-related task by Boris Becker , but was then clearly inferior to his compatriot Alexander Rădulescu in three sets . In the doubles competition he reached the round of 16 at Wimbledon and the US Open, his best result was the quarter-finals at the French Open 2000. At the side of Michael Hill, he was defeated by the later finalists Paul Haarhuis and Sandon Stolle . In 1998 he was also in the second round of the mixed competition at Wimbledon.
Godwin played 7 singles and 2 doubles games for the South African Davis Cup team between 1999 and 2001 . He was able to win his two doubles games, his individual record was 2: 5, where he was defeated among others Greg Rusedski and Tim Henman in the game against Great Britain.
South Africa
Newport
Martin Lee