Country (sports) Great Britain French Open W (1957) Grand slams won (singles) 1 US Open SF (1956) Role Tennis player | Wimbledon QF (1956, 1958) Name Shirley Brasher French Open W (1957) Wimbledon F (1955) Highest ranking 2 | |
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Born 13 June 1934 (age 89)
Grimsby, England ( 1934-06-13 ) Similar People Chris Brasher, Christine Truman, Darlene Hard, Angela Mortimer, Nicola Pietrangeli | ||
Shirley Brasher (née Bloomer; born 13 June 1934) is a former tennis player from England who won three Grand Slam titles during her career and who was the top-ranked singles player in her country in 1957.
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Early life
She attended Cleethorpes Girls' Grammar School (became Lindsey School in 1973) in Cleethorpes.
Career
Brasher (then known as Shirley Bloomer) won the singles title at the 1957 French Championships, defeating Dorothy Head Knode in the final 6–1, 6–3. She was the runner-up in singles at the 1958 French Championships, losing to Zsuzsi Körmöczy 6–4, 1–6, 6–2, having defeated Maria Bueno in the semifinal.
Brasher teamed with Darlene Hard to win the women's doubles title at the 1957 French Championships, defeating Yola Ramírez and Rosie Reyes in the final 7–5, 4–6, 7–5. She teamed with Nicola Pietrangeli to win the mixed doubles title at the 1958 French Championships, defeating Lorraine Coghlan Robinson and Robert Howe in the final 8–6, 6–2.
Brasher partnered Patricia Ward Hales to reach the 1955 women's doubles finals at Wimbledon, where they lost to Angela Mortimer and Anne Shilcock 7–5, 6–1, and at the French Championships, where they lost to Hard and Beverly Baker Fleitz 7–5, 6–8, 13–11. They had previously beaten Mortimer and Shilcock in the British Hard Courts final and defeated Hard and Fleitz in the Wimbledon semifinals.
She reached the final of Monte Carlo in 1956, losing to Althea Gibson and with Pat Hird beat Gibson and Louise Snow in the doubles final. Having reached the final in 1956, beating Darlene Hard and losing in three sets to Angela Mortimer, she won the British Hard Court Championships at Bournemouth in 1957, beating Pat Ward, and in 1958, beating Christine Truman and Ann Haydon. She beat Louise Brough to reach the semifinals of the American Championships in 1956 and was the only player to take a set from Althea Gibson at Wimbledon in 1958, losing 6-3,6-8,6-2 in the quarterfinals. According to Lance Tingay's end of year rankings, she reached no. 7 in the world in 1956, no. 3 in 1957 and no. 5 in 1958. She won the Italian championships in 1957, beating Dorothy Knode 1-6, 9-7 6-2 in the final. She lost her title the next year to Maria Bueno in the semifinals after having match points.
Brasher played on the British Wightman Cup team from 1955 through 1960, playing the no. 2 singles in 1955, the no. 3 in 1956 (beating Dorothy Knode), and the no. 1 in 1957 and 1958. The 1958 team that included Christine Truman and Brasher won the cup, which was the first time that Great Britain had won the competition since 1930. In 1960, she and Christine Truman won the final doubles match against Janet Hopps and Dorothy Knode to bring her team to another 4–3 victory over the U.S.
Brasher played a hard baseline game, and her tennis was concerted rather than spectacular. She was a member of the Grimsby Town Tennis Club, which was located in College Street, Grimsby.
Personal life
In April 1959, she married athlete Chris Brasher who helped pace Roger Bannister to running the first sub-four-minute mile in 1954. They had three children, including their daughter Kate who played on the women's professional tennis tour in the 1980s.
Grand Slam singles tournament timeline
SR = the ratio of the number of Grand Slam singles tournaments won to the number of those tournaments played.