Little Mo

During her tragically short career,Maureen Connolly [Little Mo] became the first woman tennis player to win the Grand Slam in one year,which she achieved in 1953.She was the world number one and Wimbledon champion from 1952 to 1954 and during that time she was beaten on only four occassions.She never lost a singles match at Wimbledon and in winning her last two titles there lost fewer than twenty games.
Maureen took up tennis at the age of ten primarily because there was a public playground two doors from her home in San Diego,California.A natural left hander,she soon changed to right handed play because there had never been a great left handed woman player,and from the start her inherent sense of perfection forced her to snatch every opportunity to improve her game.
Honours came quickly.She became US junior champion at 14 became the senior champion two years later,and at 17 conquered Wimbledon.After winning the grand slam in 1953,still a day or two short of her twentieth birthday,there seemed no plausible reasonwhy she would not dominate the women`s field for another dozen years or more.Then in July 1954 she was riding her horse during a holiday at home when she collided with a cement truck,her right leg was so badly damaged it ended her competitive career.
A mere 5 foot 2 inches tall and around seven and a half stone weight when at her tennis zenith,Maureen was that rare mixture of sheer talent and inflexible purpose and industry.Primarily a baseline player she developed through sheer hard work a very adequate net game.
Apart from tennis her biggest interest was horse riding.She married the American Olympic pentathlon star Norman Brinker in 1954,they had two children.A regular writer,she later blossomed into wider fields,her television commentaries for the BBC remain some of the best ever heard from Wimbledon.
A series of operations failed to check the onset of cancer and on the eve of the 1969 Wimbledon championship,Little Mo died she was just 34..So passed a great,she matched her superb play with immaculate sportsmanship and warm friendship."My aim is to perfect my tennis" she once said "Then if my tennis is perfect i will beat everyone ".During her brief reign she did just that.