Jaroslav Drobny – Mr. Tennis

You probably haven’t heard for Jaroslav Drobny. Only the most prominent tennis experts know about this quite unusual champion.

Wimbledon starts in just a couple of days, so we are going to tell you a story about a hero who had an interesting career and life. It will be a perfect intro for the most prestigious Grand Slam of them all.

The sport was often connected with politics, and Jaroslav Drobny experienced this in the most vicious way.

During the 1930s, the situation in Europe was very complicated and the war was about to break out.

One young man from Prague who started playing tennis with only 5 years, made his first appearance at Wimbledon in 1938. He didn’t want anything besides playing the most important game in his life. And his biggest wish was to be the winner of the England Open.

Though, this wasn’t possible for him immediately.

Some 16 years later he managed to become the champion of Wimbledon, but until then he had to overcome many difficulties.
When he defeated legendary Ken Rowsell, he became the first player of some African country who held a title here. And until today, he remained that single person with such a success.

Drobny was not just a tennis player because, simultaneously, he developed his hockey career. He is also be remembered as a part of the generation which reached the World gold medal and the Olympic silver medal.

At one of his appearances, he had an eye injury which will bring him a lot of publicity later when he began making his name in the world of tennis.

But let’s start from the beginning. When the Communist Party took over the power in Czechoslovakia Jaroslav Drobny was not satisfied with the way he was used for political propaganda. He decided to run away during the Davis Cup match against Switzerland.

After his runaway, he needed a new homeland at that point of his life.
Besides being the Czechoslovakian citizen, he also had the passport of Czech and Moravska protectorate, which was the part of the Nazi Germany. But that was not relevant anymore.

Switzerland, the United States, and Australia refused to grant him much-needed papers and documents and Drobny was left alone.

And then, from nowhere, Egypt offered to accept this outstanding individual. And he returned a favor to them, by winning 3 Grand Slam tournaments. Two Roland Garros in Paris and one Wimbledon.

Besides this and many records and medals in hockey, Jaroslav Drobny was the first playboy of tennis. His injury forced his to wear the sunglasses all time during his matches, which was unseen until that point.

Later, Drobny became Hall of Fame member in both tennis and hockey gmane.
He earned that honor, by winning over 130 amateur titles and 90 of them were on clay, which is more than Rafael Nadal has at the moment.

This great champion and person, deserves to be mentioned before the upcoming Wimbledon tournament because he truly represents tennis in his best way.