Ann Jones (tennis)
Country (sports) | ![]() |
---|---|
Born | Birmingham, England | October 7, 1938
Singles | |
Career titles | 113 |
Highest ranking | 2 |
Grand Slam singles results | |
Australian Open | SF (1969) |
French Open | W (1961, 1966) |
Wimbledon | W (1969) |
US Open | F (1961, 1967) |
Ann Haydon-Jones (born Adrianne Shirley Haydon on 7 October 1938 in Birmingham, United Kingdom,[1] is a former table tennis and lawn tennis champion. She won a total of eight Grand Slam championships during her career: three in singles, three in women's doubles, and two in mixed doubles.[1]
Career
Her parents were prominent table tennis players, her father, Adrian Haydon, having been British number 1 and a competitor at world championships between 1928 and 1953. Ann, as a young girl, also took up the game, participating in five world championships in the 1950s, the best result being losing finalist in singles, doubles and mixed doubles all in 1957. Soon after this she wrote the book "Tackle Table Tennis This Way".
She was also a powerful lawn tennis player, winning the 1954 and 1955 British junior championships. In 1956, she won the Wimbledon girls' singles championship.
Haydon-Jones played lawn tennis in a highly competitive era that included some of the greatest female tennis players of all time, including Billie Jean King, Margaret Court, and Maria Bueno. Despite the fierce competition, she won the 1961 French Championships[2] and reached the final of the 1961 U.S. Championships, losing to the defending champion, Darlene Hard. In 1962, she married P.F. Jones and, recorded as Ann Haydon-Jones, won the French title for a second time in 1966.[2]
At both the Wimbledon Championships and the U.S. Championships in 1967, Haydon-Jones lost in the final to King.[2][3] Two years later, however, the two again met in the Wimbledon final. This time, Haydon-Jones took the most coveted title in the sport,[3] making her the first left-handed female player to do so. She capped off that year's Wimbledon by winning the mixed doubles championship with Australia's Fred Stolle. Her performances resulted in her being voted the BBC Sports Personality of the Year.[2] Haydon-Jones made Wimbledon 1969 her last Grand Slam singles event. She was seeded number one for the 1969 US Open but withdrew before the tournament began. She radically reduced her playing schedule for 1970, playing in South Africa successfully (winning both the Orange Free State Championships and the Western Province Championships), but then largely playing only events in the United Kingdom (UK) for the remainder of the year. She returned to the international scene to play the Federation Cup event in Australia, where she partnered Virginia Wade on the British team.[1] In 1971, Jones played on the Virginia Slims circuit, winning the U.S.$10,000 first prize for the event staged in Las Vegas, beating King in the final. Jones more or less retired after this event as she was expecting her first child. However, Jones continued to play the occasional UK event and was part of the 1975 Wightman Cup team for Great Britain. In 1977, Jones teamed with Winnie Wooldridge to play doubles at Wimbledon.[1]
According to Lance Tingay of The Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail and Bud Collins, Haydon-Jones was ranked in the world top ten from 1957 through 1963 and from 1965 through 1970, reaching a career high of World No. 2 in those rankings in 1967 and 1969.[4]
According to Mark Lewisohn in The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions, on 4 July 1969, The Beatles paused the dubbing session for their song "Golden Slumbers" to listen to Haydon-Jones beat King for the Wimbledon title, live on radio.
With the dawn of the open era in 1968, Haydon-Jones joined with King and others to organize the first professional female touring group. In 1970, she was hired by the BBC as a guest commentator [2] and worked with them for over three decades, while occasionally commentating for US TV stations tennis coverage. Jones was chairperson of the Women's International Tennis Council and for many years the British team captain for events such as the Federation and Wightman Cups.[1]
Haydon-Jones was also the butt of many jokes on Monty Python's Flying Circus during its series run.
In 1985, Haydon-Jones was voted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame.[1] For many years, Jones was chairperson of the International Women's Tennis Council and has long been a member of Wimbledon's Committee of Management. She became the first ever 'civilian woman' (i.e. not a member of the British Royal Family) to present the trophies at Wimbledon, when she awarded the winners of the Mixed Doubles championship their cup in 2007, a ceremony she now regularly performs. She has since also presented the junior girls trophy.
Grand Slam record
- Australian Open
- Mixed Doubles champion: 1969
- U.S. Championships
- Singles runner-up: 1961, 1967
- Women's Doubles runner-up: 1960
Grand Slam singles finals
Wins (3)
Year | Championship | Opponent in Final | Score in Final |
1961 | French Championships | ![]() |
6–2, 6–1 |
1966 | French Championships (2) | ![]() |
6–3, 6–1 |
1969 | Wimbledon | ![]() |
3–6, 6–3, 6–2 |
Runner-ups (6)
Year | Championship | Opponent in Final | Score in Final |
1961 | U.S. Championships | ![]() |
6–3, 6–4 |
1963 | French Championships | ![]() |
2–6, 6–3, 7–5 |
1967 | Wimbledon | ![]() |
6–3, 6–4 |
1967 | U.S. Championships | ![]() |
11-9, 6–4 |
1968 | French Open | ![]() |
5–7, 6–4, 6–1 |
1969 | French Open | ![]() |
6–1, 4–6, 6–3 |
Grand Slam singles tournament timeline
Tournament | 1956 | 1957 | 1958 | 1959 | 1960 | 1961 | 1962 | 1963 | 1964 | 1965 | 1966 | 1967 | 1968 | 1969 | Career SR |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Australia | A | A | A | A | A | A | A | A | A | 2R | A | A | A | SF | 0 / 2 |
France | A | SF | QF | A | 4R | W | SF | F | A | QF | W | QF | F | F | 2 / 11 |
Wimbledon | 2R | 3R | SF | QF | SF | 4R | SF | SF | QF | 4R | SF | F | SF | W | 1 / 14 |
United States | A | QF | 3R | SF | QF | F | A | SF | QF | QF | A | F | SF | A | 0 / 10 |
SR | 0 / 1 | 0 / 3 | 0 / 3 | 0 / 2 | 0 / 3 | 1 / 3 | 0 / 2 | 0 / 3 | 0 / 2 | 0 / 4 | 1 / 2 | 0 / 3 | 0 / 3 | 1 / 3 | 3 / 37 |
A = did not participate in the tournament.
SR = the ratio of the number of Grand Slam singles tournaments won to the number of those tournaments played.
Jones was in fact the number one seed for the 1969 US Open Singles, but withdrew from the tournament just before it began.
Singles titles (113)
![]() | This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources. (January 2009) |
- 1956 – Cheltenham, Sunderland Championships, Welsh Championships, Worthing Hard Courts, North of England Championships
- 1957 – Tally Ho! Tournament, Northumberland County Championships, Malvern, Sunderland Championships, South of England Championships
- 1958 - Tally Ho!, Durham
- 1959 - Mexico City, Pan American Championships
- 1960 – Finnish Championships, Scandinavian Indoors, German Indoors, Good Neighbor Championships Miami, St. Petersburg Masters, Caribe Hilton International, Mexico City, St. Andrew's Invitations Kingston, Caribbean Championships, Tally Ho! Tournament, Sutton Hard Courts, Malvern Championships, Cologne Championships, Essex County Championships, Pacific Southwest Championships, Championships of Morocco, Torquay Palace Indoors.
- 1961 – Good Neighbor Championships Miami, French Championships,[2][3] Wolverhamption Open, Lowther Championships, Irish Championships, Welsh Championships, Canadian Nationals, Chilean Nationals, São Paulo Championships
- 1962 – West Province Championships, Hewlett's Hard Courts Durban, French Indoors, Scandinavian Indoors, British Covered Court Championships, Cumberland Hard Courts, Sutton Hard Courts, London Hard Courts, Cheltenham, Midland Championships (shared), Welsh Championships, St. Moritz, Palce Torquay
- 1963 - Coupe Pierre Gillou, German Indoors, Scandinavian Indoor Championships, French Indoors, Carlton International, Sutton Championships, British Hard Courts, London Hard Courts, Wolverhampton, Cheltenham, Hoylake Open, Carlyon Bay Championships
- 1964 - British Hard Courts, Sutton Coldfield , Surrey Championships, Bavarian Championships, British Covered Court Championships, Carlyon Bay Covered Courts
- 1965 - German Indoors, French Indoors, Dutch Indoor, Cumberland Championships, Sutton Hard Courts, British Hard Courts, British Covered Court Championships, Carlyon Bay Covered Courts, Palace Torquay
- 1966 - German Indoors, French Indoors, Cumberland Championships, British Hard Courts, Connaught, Italian Championships, French Championships,[2][3] Moscow International
- 1967 - German Indoors, Scandinavian Indoors, Dixie International, Barranquilla Championships, Caracas Championships, Curaçao Invitational, Mexico City, Caribe Hilton International, Masters Invitational, Kent Championships, Essex Championships
- 1968 - Caracas, Queen's Club (shared), Argentine & South American Open
- 1969 - New Zealand Open, Monte Carlo Open, Belgian Open, Queen's Club Grass Championships, Wimbledon,[2] Aix-En-Provence Championships, British Covered Court Championships
- 1970 - Orange Free State Championships, Western Province Championships, Benson & Hedges Open, Bio-Strath London Hard Court Championships, Surrey Grass Courts, Chichester, Eastbourne International, Turkish International, Dewar Cup Torquay
- 1971 - Caribe Hilton International, Caesar's Palace World Pro
- 1975 - Torquay Palace Indoors
See also
References
- ^ a b c d e f "International Tennis Hall of Fame". © 2006 International Tennis Hall of Fame. Retrieved 3 March 2009. [dead link]
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l "BBC Sport: Ann Jones". © 2003-2009 BBC Sport. 20 July 2002. Retrieved 4 March 2009.
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- ^ a b c d e f g h "Today in Sport Archives". © 2004-2009 Today In Sport.Com. 12 April 2004. Retrieved 4 March 2009.
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- ^ Collins, Bud (2008). The Bud Collins History of Tennis: An Authoritative Encyclopedia and Record Book. New York, N.Y: New Chapter Press. pp. 695, 703. ISBN 0-942257-41-3.
Tackle Table Tennis This Way, by Ann Haydon, 1958 (Now out of print)
External links
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- Use dmy dates from September 2010
- 1938 births
- Living people
- Australian Open (tennis) champions
- BBC Sports Personality of the Year winners
- British female tennis players
- English tennis players
- French Championships (tennis) champions
- French Open champions
- Sportspeople from Birmingham, West Midlands
- International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees
- Wimbledon champions