As a reminder, the qualifying round is for players who played singles at Wimbledon but did not win a match in this period. I have included a number of wild cards to bring the totals up to 45 for men and women.
There are 5 groups of 9 players with a random draw.
Those with the highest number of votes (with a maximum of 16 players) across all the 5 groups will qualify for the 1st round proper.
Please feel free to provide reasons for your choices along with any memories that you may have of them.
! am planning to close the polls at around 10.00 on Saturday morning.
-- Edited by brittak on Thursday 30th of April 2020 10:20:14 PM
Dan Cox gets my vote here. He is currently toying with his "fan base" on Twitter as he keeps tweeting the word "Comeback". My guess is that he is as good a wind up merchant as he was a tennis player.
This is the laggard mens group, a little more colour on these guys maybe:
Alan Mills - was Wimbledon referee for some time, beat Rod Laver once and was also a Davis Cup Player in his time as per below - "Mills was himself an accomplished tennis player. At the age of 17 he was the senior county champion in his home county of Lancashire, and he reached the last 16 in the men's singles at Wimbledon on two occasions. He was also the first man in the history of the Davis Cup to win a match with the scoreline 60, 60, 60, completing the match in just 32 minutes."
Mills was the first Englishman to defeat Rod Laver when the Australian came to Britain.[1]
He became a professional tennis coach in 1966 and played matches on the professional tour.[2]
(WC) Nigel Sears - Sears reached a career high singles ranking of World No. 382 on 4 January 1982, and a career high doubles ranking of World No. 581 on 2 January 1984.[3] He lost his only professional singles match, but won two of the ten professional doubles matches he played. Went on to become a well known coach to players such as Hantuchova, Kontaveit and others
Dan Cox - Won 14 Futures events and reached a high of nearly top 200
Tom Spinks - Won a Challenger Doubles title and reached 422 in singles rankings.
Jason Goodall - now a commentator and coach, Goodall was ranked as high as British number two as a senior and was also national senior doubles champion. He was chosen to be part of the British team in two Davis Cup ties in 1989; away against Finland, which Britain won 41, and at home against Argentina, which the hosts lost 32.
(WC) Andrew Bettles - coach to Elina Svitolina and former British Junior Champion
Rohun Beven - cant find much on him, suspect he was Middlesex player? Reached last 8 of 1975 Wimbledon Juniors though. I also feel he played doubles with Jeremy Dier a lot, maybe at Wimbledon - Jeremy Dier is Eric Dier's Dad
Martin Robinson - won matches at AO and FO. A left-handed player from Bolton, Robinson competed on the professional tour in the 1970s and reached a career singles best ranking of 105 in the world. In the 1975 season he made the second round of both the Australian Open and French Open. Robinson also featured in the main draw at Wimbledon during his career, including in 1976 when he lost in the first round to seventh seed Roscoe Tanner.[2]
(WC) Sean Thornley - known more as a doubles player with David Rice - In 2011 Thornley and Rice qualified for the Men's Doubles at Wimbledon.[1] They lost in the first round to Jamie Murray and Sergiy Stakhovsky, 36, 57.
After a successful year, Thornley and Rice were awarded a wildcard in 2013 in to the Wimbledon Championships Doubles Main Draw, where they lost in the first round in five sets, 46, 36, 76(7), 64, 46 to Marinko Matosevic and Frank Moser.
Sean Thornley and David Rice have won 21 international doubles titles together.
-- Edited by JonH comes home on Friday 1st of May 2020 03:43:13 PM
This is the laggard mens group, a little more colour on these guys maybe:
Alan Mills - was Wimbledon referee for some time, beat Rod Laver once and was also a Davis Cup Player in his time as per below - "Mills was himself an accomplished tennis player. At the age of 17 he was the senior county champion in his home county of Lancashire, and he reached the last 16 in the men's singles at Wimbledon on two occasions. He was also the first man in the history of the Davis Cup to win a match with the scoreline 60, 60, 60, completing the match in just 32 minutes."
Mills was the first Englishman to defeat Rod Laver when the Australian came to Britain.[1]
He became a professional tennis coach in 1966 and played matches on the professional tour.[2]
(WC) Nigel Sears - Sears reached a career high singles ranking of World No. 382 on 4 January 1982, and a career high doubles ranking of World No. 581 on 2 January 1984.[3] He lost his only professional singles match, but won two of the ten professional doubles matches he played. Went on to become a well known coach to players such as Hantuchova, Kontaveit and others
Dan Cox - Won 14 Futures events and reached a high of nearly 300
Tom Spinks - Won a Challenger Doubles title and reached 422 in singles rankings.
Jason Goodall - now a commentator and coach, Goodall was ranked as high as British number two as a senior and was also national senior doubles champion. He was chosen to be part of the British team in two Davis Cup ties in 1989; away against Finland, which Britain won 41, and at home against Argentina, which the hosts lost 32.
(WC) Andrew Bettles - coach to Elina Svitolina and former British Junior Champion
Rohun Beven - cant find much on him, suspect he was Middlesex player? Reached last 8 of 1975 Wimbledon Juniors though. I also feel he played doubles with Jeremy Dier a lot, maybe at Wimbledon - Jeremy Dier is Eric Dier's Dad
Martin Robinson - won matches at AO and FO. A left-handed player from Bolton, Robinson competed on the professional tour in the 1970s and reached a career singles best ranking of 105 in the world. In the 1975 season he made the second round of both the Australian Open and French Open. Robinson also featured in the main draw at Wimbledon during his career, including in 1976 when he lost in the first round to seventh seed Roscoe Tanner.[2]
(WC) Sean Thornley - known more as a doubles player with David Rice - In 2011 Thornley and Rice qualified for the Men's Doubles at Wimbledon.[1] They lost in the first round to Jamie Murray and Sergiy Stakhovsky, 36, 57.
After a successful year, Thornley and Rice were awarded a wildcard in 2013 in to the Wimbledon Championships Doubles Main Draw, where they lost in the first round in five sets, 46, 36, 76(7), 64, 46 to Marinko Matosevic and Frank Moser.
Sean Thornley and David Rice have won 21 international doubles titles together.
Thanks Jon - I was just looking at this one and thought it needed a boost but you beat me to it!
