Vladimír Černík (9 July 1917 – 2 April 2002) was a

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus *Czech (surnam ...

tennis player who represented

Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...

and later Egypt. He was a mainstay of his country's Davis Cup team in the years immediately following World War II, helping them reach the Inter-Zonal final in successive years in 1947 and 1948, though they fell to

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

on both occasions. His biggest individual tournament victories in singles were his two

Swiss International Championships The Swiss International Championships or simply the Swiss Championships was a combined men's and women's clay court tennis tournament established by the Swiss Lawn Tennis Association, and first played at Grasshopper Club, Zurich, Switzerland in 189 ...

in 1946 and 1950. In July 1949, he and Davis Cup team-mate

Jaroslav Drobný Jaroslav Drobný (; 12 October 1921 – 13 September 2001) was a world No. 1 amateur tennis and ice hockey champion. He left Czechoslovakia in 1949 and travelled as an Egyptian citizen before becoming a citizen of the United Kingdom in 1959, w ...

defected while attending that year's Swiss Championships in Gstaad. He continued to tour the amateur tennis circuit thereafter, first with Swiss papers until in 1950 he and Drobný were both granted Egyptian citizenship. Subsequently Černík was able to settle in the United States, and worked for two years as the head coach of the

Tar Heels Tar Heel (or Tarheel) is a nickname applied to the U.S. state of North Carolina and its people. It is also the nickname of the University of North Carolina athletic teams, students, alumni, and fans. The origins of the Tar Heel nickname trace ba ...

, the men's tennis programme at the University of North Carolina. In later life Černík retired to Palm Beach, Florida, where he was the Tennis Professional at the Everglades Club. He died in 2002.

Performance timeline

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Cernik, Vladimir 1917 births 2002 deaths Czech male tennis players Czechoslovak defectors Czechoslovak male tennis players Sportspeople from Roudnice nad Labem Tennis players from the Ústí nad Labem Region