Jaroslav Drobný

Jaroslav Drobný was a left-handed tennis and ice hockey player who became world number one among amateurs. Born in 1921 in what was then Czechoslovakia, he defected in July 1949, disliking how the communist government used his fame, and for years played as a stateless man before travelling as an Egyptian citizen and later becoming a British citizen in 1959. At Wimbledon he competed under four different national identities. He won the French Open in 1951 and 1952, was the first and so far only Egyptian to take that title, and finally won Wimbledon in 1954 by beating Ken Rosewall after losing the finals of 1949 and 1952. He also won three Italian Championships and the 1948 French Open men's doubles. He played for the Czechoslovak ice hockey team and was inducted into both the International Tennis Hall of Fame, in 1983, and the International Ice Hockey Federation Hall of Fame.