Ann Haydon-Jones (born Adrianne Shirley Haydon on 7 October 1938 in Birmingham, United Kingdom, 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.

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 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.

At both the Wimbledon Championships and the U.S. Championships in 1967, Haydon-Jones lost in the final to King. Two years later, however, the two again met in the Wimbledon final. This time, Haydon-Jones took the most coveted title in the sport, 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 as the BBC Sports Personality of the Year. Haydon-Jones made Wimbledon 1969 her last Grand Slam singles event. She was seeded first for the 1969 US Open but withdrew before the tournament began. She radically reduced her playing schedule for 1970, playing in South Africa successfully^{[citation needed]} and 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. 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.

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.^[1]

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 and worked with them for over three decades. 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.

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. 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. She has since presented the junior girls trophy.

Grand Slam record

• Australian Open
  • Mixed Doubles champion: 1969

• French Championships/Open
  • Singles champion: 1961, 1966
  • Singles runner-up: 1963, 1968, 1969
  • Women's Doubles champion: 1963, 1968, 1969
  • Women's Doubles runner-up: 1960
  • Mixed Doubles runner-up: 1960, 1966, 1967

• Wimbledon
  • Singles champion: 1969
  • Singles runner-up: 1967
  • Women's Doubles runner-up: 1968
  • Mixed Doubles champion: 1969
  • Mixed Doubles runner-up: 1962

• 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	Yola Ramírez Ochoa	6–2, 6–1
1966	French Championships (2)	Nancy Richey Gunter	6–3, 6–1
1969	Wimbledon	Billie Jean King	3–6, 6–3, 6–2

Runner-ups (6)

Year	Championship	Opponent in Final	Score in Final
1961	U.S. Championships	Darlene Hard	6–3, 6–4
1963	French Championships	Lesley Turner Bowrey	2–6, 6–3, 7–5
1967	Wimbledon	Billie Jean King	6–3, 6–4
1967	U.S. Championships	Billie Jean King	11-9, 6–4
1968	French Open	Nancy Richey Gunter	5–7, 6–4, 6–1
1969	French Open	Margaret Court	6–1, 4–6, 6–3

Grand Slam singles tournament timeline

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.

Singles titles (113)

• 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

• 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, Wolverhamption Open, Lowther Championships, Irish Championships, Welsh Championships, Canadian Nationals, Chilean Nationals, Sao Paolo Championships

• 1962 – West Province Championships, Hewlett's Hard Courts, French Indoors, Scandinavian Indoors, British Covered Courts, Cumberland Hard Courts, Sutton Hard Courts, London Hard Courts, Cheltenham, Midland Championships, Welsh Championships

• 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 Indoors, Carlyon Bay Covered Courts

• 1965 - German Indoors, French Indoors, Dutch Indoor, Cumberland Championships, Sutton Hard Courts, British Hard Courts, British Indoors, Carlyon Bay Covered Courts

• 1966 - German Indoors, French Indoors, Cumberland Championships, British Hard Courts, Italian Championships, French Championships, Moscow International

• 1967 - German Indoors, Scandinavian Indoors, Dixie International, St. Andrews Invitational, Barranquilla Championships, Caracas Championships, Curaçao Invitational, Mexico City, Caribe Hilton International, Masters Invitational, Kent Championships, Essex Championships

• 1968 - Queen's Club, Argentine & South American Open

• 1969 - Monte Carlo Open, Belgian Open, Queen's Club Grass Championships, Wimbledon, Aix-En-Provence Championships, Pacific Southwest Championships, British Indoors

• 1970 - Orange Free State Championships, Western Province Championships, Benson & Hedges Open, Bio-Strath London Hard Court Championships, Surrey Grass Courts, Eastbourne International, Turkish International, Dewar Cup Torquay

• 1971 - Caribe Hilton International, Caesar's Palace World Pro

• 1975 - Torquay Palace Indoors

See also

• Performance timelines for all female tennis players who reached at least one Grand Slam final

References

Tackle Table Tennis This Way, by Ann Haydon, 1958 (Now out of print)

External links

• International Tennis Hall of Fame profile