Headley Thomas Baxter (29 March 1919 – 31 August 2004) was a British

tennis Tennis is a List of racket sports, racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles (tennis), singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles (tennis), doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket st ...

player and coach. He was active from 1939 to 1953 and contested 10 career singles finals and won 6 titles.

Career

A native of

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a Historic counties of England, former county in South East England, now mainly within Greater London. Its boundaries largely followed three rivers: the River Thames, Thames in the south, the River Lea, Le ...

, Baxter was the British junior champion in 1935 and 1936. He played his first senior event in 1938 at the Worthing Open where he reached the final, before losing to Alan Brown. In 1939 he won his first singles title at the Cranleigh Open against Guy Cooper. He won through to the singles third round of the 1947 Wimbledon Championships and took a set off third seed Tom Brown before being eliminated. During his playing career he was a member of British

Davis Cup The Davis Cup is the premier international team event in men's tennis. It is organised by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and contested annually between teams from over 150 competing countries, making it the world's largest annual ...

teams but was never called upon for a rubber. His career singles highlights include winning the Berkshire Championships three times in 1939, 1946 and 1947. He also won the Cumberland Hard Court Championships in 1948 against Dennis Slack. In addition he was also a losing finalist at the Norfolk Championships in 1948 to Clifford Hovell, the Paddington Hard Court tournament in 1949 to Roland Carter and again in 1951 to Tony Starte, the Southdean Hard Court Championships in 1951 on clay courts where he lost to Paddy Roberts. He also took part in the 1948

French Championships The French Open (), also known as Roland-Garros (), is a tennis tournament organized by the French Tennis Federation annually at Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France. It is chronologically the second of the four Grand Slam tennis events eve ...

where he lost in the second round to Dragutin Mitic. Baxter won his final singles title at the final edition of the Middlesex Championships in 1949 against Cliff Hovell. He played his final tournament at the 1953 Wimbledon Championships. Baxter was non playing

captain for Great Britain from 1962 to 1967, then again from 1968 to 1971, both largely unsuccessful periods. He had resigned as captain in 1967 citing business commitments but was put in charge again the next year when his replacement Peter Hare had to step aside due to ill health.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Baxter, Headley 1919 births 2004 deaths English male tennis players British male tennis players British tennis coaches Tennis players from London 20th-century English sportsmen