Australian tennis player
Lewis Alan Hoad (23 November 1934 – 3 July 1994) was an Australian tennis player whose career ran from 1950 to 1973. Hoad won four Major singles tournaments as an amateur (the Australian Championships, French Championships and two Wimbledons). He was a member of the Australian team that won the Davis Cup four times between 1952 and 1956. Hoad turned professional in July 1957. He won the Kooyong Tournament of Champions in 1958 and the Forest Hills Tournament of Champions in 1959. He won the Ampol Open Trophy world series of tournaments in 1959, which included the Kooyong tournament that concluded in early January 1960. Hoad's men's singles tournament victories spanned from 1951 to 1971.
Hoad was ranked the world No. 1 amateur in 1953 by Harry Hopman, by Noel Brown and by the editors of Tennis de France, and also in 1956 by Lance Tingay, by Ned Potter, and by Tennis de France. He was ranked the world No. 1 professional for 1959 in Kramer's Ampol point ranking system, and by Robert Barnes (Kramer's Australian manager).
Serious back problems plagued Hoad throughout his career, possibly caused by a weight-lifting exercise that he devised in 1954. The back injury became particularly intense following the 1956 Wimbledon championships, continued periodically, and led to his semi-retirement from tennis in 1967. Afterwards, he made sporadic appearances at tournaments, enticed by the advent of the Open Era in 1968 and was seeded No. 7 for the 1968 Wimbledon Championships and seeded No. 12 for the 1970 French Open.
Following his retirement in 1973, Hoad and his wife Jenny Staley Hoad constructed, owned and operated a tennis resort, "Lew Hoad's Campo de Tenis" and "Lew Hoad Tennis Village" in Fuengirola, Spain, where he died of leukaemia on 3 July 1994, aged 59.
Early life and career.
Lewis Hoad was born on 23 November 1934, in the working-class Sydney inner suburb of Glebe, the eldest of three sons of tramway electrician Alan Hoad and his wife, Ailsa Lyle Burbury. Hoad started playing tennis at age five with a racket gifted by a local social club. As a young child, he would wake up at 5 a.m. and hit tennis balls against a wall and garage door until the neighbours complained, and he was allowed to practice on the courts of the Hereford Tennis Club behind the house. At age 10 he competed in the seaside tournament at Manly in the under 16 category.
In his youth, Hoad often played Ken Rosewall, and they became known as the Sydney "twins", although they had very different physiques, personalities and playing styles. Their first match in Sydney in January 1947 (when both were aged 12) was played as an opener of an exhibition match between Australia and America. Rosewall won 6–0, 6–0. Hoad built up great physical strength, especially in his hands and arms, by training at a police boys' club, where he made a name as a boxer. Hoad was about 12 when he was introduced to Adrian Quist, a former Australian tennis champion and then general manager of the Dunlop sports goods company. Quist played a couple of sets with Hoad and was impressed by his natural ability. When Hoad was 14 he left school and joined the Dunlop payroll, following the pattern of that 'shamateur' era when most of Australia's brightest tennis prospects were employed by sporting goods companies.
Hoad had just turned 15 when he and Rosewall were selected to play for New South Wales in an interstate contest against Victoria. In November 1949, Hoad won the junior title at the New South Wales Championships, and the same weekend, he also competed in the final of the junior table tennis championship in Sydney.
Tennis career.
Amateur career: 1950–1957.
Hoad lost to Dick Savitt in four sets in round one of the New South Wales State championships in November. In his match report, Adrian Quist said, "Hoad played well, and held a lead of 4-2 in the third set after winning the second. At present he makes too many errors. He will have to learn good control from the ground before his game will reach great heights." Hoad reached the semi-finals of County of Cumberland championships in Sydney in December, losing to Bill Sidwell. "It was apparent from the start of play that Sidwell did not intend to take the youngster lightly. He served with pressure and followed the majority of his returns to the net. The first set was very evenly contested. Had Hoad not fallen into easy errors he may well have won the opening set. The experience of Sidwell, however, prevailed during the important exchanges", said Adrian Quist.
Hoad's first Grand Slam tournament appearance was at the 1951 Australian Championships held in January at the White City Tennis Club in Sydney. He won his first match against Ronald McKenzie in straight sets but lost in the following round to defending champion and countryman Frank Sedgman. It was the only Grand Slam tournament he played that year.
Hoad won his first men's singles title, the Brisbane Exhibition tournament at Milton, on grass, on 11 August 1951, defeating Rosewall in the final in four sets. In September, Hoad won New South Wales hardcourt championships beating George Worthington in the final.
In 1952, Hoad reached the third round of the Australian Championships in Adelaide. In April, he was selected by the Australasian Lawn Tennis Association as member of the team to play in overseas tournaments. In May, before departing to Europe, he won the singles title at the Australian Hardcourt Championships on clay after a five-set win in the final against Rosewall. Hoad, who had never played a tournament on European red clay courts, received a walkover in the first round of the French Championships and lost in straight sets to sixth-seeded and 1947 and 1951 finalist Eric Sturgess. In only their second appearance as a doubles team at a Grand Slam event, Hoad and Rosewall reached the French semifinal. Hoad lost in the quarterfinal of the Belgian championships in Brussels in early June, where he was defeated by Budge Patty.
Hoad's first entry at the grass court Queen's Club Championship in June 1952 ended in the quarterfinal against eventual champion Frank Sedgman. A week later, he played his first match at the Wimbledon Championships defeating Beppe Merlo in a nervous and unimpressive five-set encounter. Wins against Rolando Del Bello and Freddie Huber were followed by a fourth round loss against second-seeded and eventual finalist Jaroslav Drobný. Hoad and Rosewall caused an upset when they defeated second-seeded Gardnar Mulloy and Dick Savitt in the third round of the doubles event, but lost in the semifinal against Vic Seixas and Eric Sturgess.
After a semifinal result at the Swedish championships in July, and an exhibition between Australia and West Germany, Hoad and the Australian team traveled to the United States under the guidance of coach Harry Hopman. As a preparation for his first U.S. Championships he played the Meadow Club Invitational (Southampton), Eastern Grass Court Championships (South Orange), and Newport Invitational before teaming up with Rosewall to reach the semifinal of the U.S. National Doubles Championships in Brookline, Massachusetts. Hoad was the eighth seeded foreign player at the U.S. Championships. He won four matches to reach his first Grand Slam quarterfinal but due in part to making 64 errors could not overcome Sedgman who would win the tournament without losing a set. With Thelma Coyne Long he reached the final of the mixed doubles event, the first Grand Slam final of his career, but they lost in straight sets to Doris Hart and Frank Sedgman. An early loss at the Pacific Southwest Championships in September concluded his first overseas tour. In September, he was jointly ranked No. 10 in the world for 1952 with Rosewall by Lance Tingay of "The Daily Telegraph".
Hoad started 1953 poorly in the singles with a second-round exit against Clive Wilderspin at the Australian Championships in Melbourne after playing an uncharacteristic baseline game. He was more successful in doubles where he and Rosewall became the youngest team to win the Australian doubles title after a victory in the final against Mervyn Rose and Don Candy. In March, Hoad defended his singles title at the Australian Hardcourt Championships, defeating Rosewall in a five set semifinal in which he survived six matchpoints, and 34-year-old John Bromwich in the final. Two weeks later, Hoad lost the final of the N.S.W. Hardcourt Championships against Mervyn Rose.
Hoad's second overseas tour started in late April, and after an exhibition in Cairo at the Gezira Sporting Club, he reached the final at Italian Championships in Rome losing to Drobný in straight sets but won the doubles title with Rosewall. At the French Championships in May, Hoad was seeded fourth and made it to the quarterfinals in which he lost to Vic Seixas due to overhitting and an unreliable serve. Hoad and Rosewall won the doubles title with a three-set win in the final against countrymen Rose and Wilderspin. In June, Hoad's attacking serve-and-volley game proved too good for Wimbledon favorite Rosewall in the final of the Queen's Club Championship and he won the tournament without losing a set. At Wimbledon, Hoad was seeded sixth, and as at the French, Vic Seixas defeated him in the quarterfinal, this time in a close five-set match that ended on a Hoad double fault. In an all-Australian doubles final Hoad and Rosewall defeated Hartwig and Rose. Hoad lost to Enrique Morea in the final of the Dutch Championships in mid July. He won his first title on U.S. soil in South Orange at the Eastern Grass Court Championships in mid August, defeating compatriot Rex Hartwig in the final. In the semifinal against Rosewall, he pulled a back muscle. Hoad and Rosewall's hopes of winning the doubles Grand Slam, two years after fellow Australians Ken McGregor and Frank Sedgman had first achieved that feat, were dashed when they lost surprisingly in the third round of the U.S. Doubles Championships. At the U.S. Championships Hoad (second foreign seed) won four matches to reach the semifinal where for the third time in 1953 he lost in a Grand Slam event to Vic Seixas. Following his defeat, and that of Rosewall in the other semifinal, there was criticism in the press that both 18-year-old players were physically and mentally worn out due to the intensive schedule imposed by coach Harry Hopman. In September, Seixas again beat Hoad, this time in the semifinal of the Pacific Southwest Championships in Los Angeles.
Hoad was rested a few weeks upon his return to Australia and then won the Queensland Championships in early November in a 41-minute final against Hartwig. Two weeks later, Hoad won the N.S.W. Championships after four-set victories over Tony Trabert in the semi-final and over Rosewall in the final in front of a 10,000 Sydney crowd but had trouble with a sore right elbow. In early December at the Victorian Championships he defeated Rosewall in the final. The much anticipated Davis Cup challenge round match against the challenging team from the United States took place at the Melbourne Kooyong Stadium in late December. Surprisingly Hartwig was selected to partner Hoad in the doubles instead of Rosewall, a decision widely criticized in the press.
In the opening singles matches, Hoad defeated Seixas, his nemesis that season, in straight sets, while Trabert defeated Rosewall, also in straight sets. Hoad and Hartwig lost the doubles match against Seixas and Trabert and Australia trailed 1–2 at the start of the final day. Hoad is remembered for his match as a 19-year-old amateur against the United States champion Tony Trabert. In front of a 17,000 crowd, he defeated Trabert in five sets to help his country retain the Cup. It was seen as one of the best Davis Cup matches in history. Directly following the final, Hoad received his call-up papers for National Service.
Hoad was ranked world No. 5 amateur for 1953 by Lance Tingay in his September rankings. At the end of the year, Hoad was ranked world No. 1 amateur for the complete season of 1953 by Harry Hopman, by Noel Brown and by the editors of "Tennis de France", published by Philippe Chatrier. Tingay stated in September 1954 that Hoad in 1953 had "played so well during the Australian season that his status as best in the world was axiomatic." He added that