Torsten Johansson (11 April 1920 – 14 May 2004) was a Swedish
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...
player who was active during the 1940s, 50s and 60s.
Tennis career
Johansson set a record by shutting out two opponents at the
1947 Wimbledon, when he beat Brian Royds and Pierre Geeland De Merxem, 6–0, 6–0, 6–0 in the first and second rounds respectively.
Johansson played for the Royal Tennis Club of Stockholm in the early 1940s and won more than 100 national titles for the club, a record that still stands. Johansson also won 32 Swedish National titles, being 7 titles in singles (4 indoor and 3 outdoor), 10 in doubles (3 indoor and 7 outdoor) as well as 15 mixed doubles titles (5 indoor and 10 outdoor).
During the period 1946 to 1960 he played 72
Davis Cup matches for
Sweden of which 51 were victorious. His last match was the
1960 Europe Zone semifinal victory against
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
. He and
Lennart Bergelin, coach of
Björn Borg, turned Sweden into a tennis power after World War II.
Johansson won 14 international tournaments in his career, including the Swedish Open in 1947, the Copenhagen Indoor Amateur in 1949 and 1950, the Dusseldorf International (beating
Jaroslav Drobny
Jaroslav (also written as Yaroslav or Jarosław in other Slavic languages) is a Czech and Slovak first name, pagan in origin.
There are several possible origins of the name Jaroslav. It is very likely that originally the two elements of the nam ...
in the semifinals) and the German International Covered Court Championship 1956. In 1956, he was also a finalist to
Ian Vermaak at the South African Championships.
After retiring, Johansson became a world-wide distributor of Tretorn Shoes from Sweden and established an outlet in the United States with Bancroft Sporting Goods. He was a World Class Player in Senior Tournaments until his death in 2004. In 2005, he was posthumously inducted into the Swedish Tennis Hall of Fame.
See also
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List of Sweden Davis Cup team representatives
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Johansson, Torsten
1920 births
2004 deaths
Swedish male tennis players
People from Karlsborg Municipality
Sportspeople from Västra Götaland County