Nikola Pilić

Nikola Pilić was a Croatian professional tennis player who competed for SFR Yugoslavia, born in Split on 27 August 1939 and died in Rijeka on 23 September 2025. He took up tennis in 1952 and reached the Wimbledon semifinals in 1967. In 1968 he was one of the Handsome Eight signed by Lamar Hunt for the new professional World Championship Tennis group. He won the 1970 US Open men's doubles title with Pierre Barthès, and his best singles showing at a major was the 1973 French Open final, which he lost to Ilie Năstase. His suspension by the Yugoslav tennis federation in 1973 led 81 professionals, organised in the Association of Tennis Professionals, to withdraw from Wimbledon that year, a boycott in which he was the catalyst. He later became a coach and was the first captain to win the Davis Cup with three nations: Germany, Croatia and Serbia.