Aleksandar Popović ( sr-Cyrl, Александар Поповић, was a Yugoslav tennis player of Serbian ethnicity.
Biography
Aleksandar Popović was born in Belgrade. In 1926 he was invited to a non-
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 ...
match against Greece, which Greece won. He became the Yugoslavian national champion in singles in 1927. His final lasted only 24 games, with a final score of 6:2, 6:3, 6:1. Popović was one of the early baseliner players who hit a dozen cross-court shots before converting a point a strategy that suited him well. He was triumphant in the doubles with the same easy manner, which took him only one game more to finish the final (6:2, 6:3, 6:2).
Fortunately for Popović,
György Dungyersky, the original line-up member for the
Kingdom of Yugoslavia Davis Cup team in their 1928 Davis Cup first round match against
Finland
Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...
, got sick. As he was a reserve player he stepped in to replace him. Rain was a constant factor during the match and the meeting lasted seven days instead of the usual three. The Yugoslavians didn't have much expectations on the doubles as this marked the first time Popović paired with
Franjo Šefer
Franjo Šefer ( ; or ; born 1905 in Vienna) was a Yugoslav tennis player of Austrian-Jewish descent.
Early life and family
Franjo Šefer was born in 1905 in Vienna to a Jewish family. They moved to Karlovac in 1910, where he made his first st ...
, while the Finnish enlisted the seasoned duo of
Arne Grahn and
Bo Grotenfeld to oppose them. Less than a month later, at the championship of Yugoslavia in Zagreb, Popović retained his title in the international field. In the semifinals he had a tough duel with Podvineć, which he won in three sets. In the final he won with Dr. Müller as his partner.
After World War II he emigrated to Switzerland, where he no longer played tennis and changed his surname.
Notes
*According to the Tennis Association of Serbia, the Davis Cup website is incorrect. Thus, the outcome of these matches is unsure. The dates marked are the originally scheduled three days and the players field is also incomplete. Due to the rain delay, Popović couldn't have more time to wait for his match and traveled from Zagreb; he was replaced by the second reserve,
Aleksandar Podvineć.
Footnotes
Works cited
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External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Popovic, Aleksandar
Yugoslav male tennis players
Serbian male tennis players
Serbian emigrants to Switzerland
Year of birth missing
Place of death missing
Year of death missing
Yugoslav emigrants to Switzerland