Stability of convex spheres (Q7016709)

A classical result by V. Toponogov states that any simple closed geodesic on a surface with Gaussian curvature \(\geq 1\) has length at most \(2\pi\), with equality if and only if the surface is isometric to the standard sphere. The authors investigate the stability of this result: specifically, whether the existence of a simple closed geodesic of (nearly) maximal length implies that the surface is close to the standard sphere in the Cheeger-Gromov metric. Focusing on the case where the width of the sphere, that is, the length of the shortest simple closed geodesic, is close to \(2\pi\), the main result establishes that this condition indeed implies stability, even with respect to a relatively strong topology.