The early years
France · born Paris, 1890 · died 1951 · Wimbledon doubles champion 1911, with Max Decugis the first French winners of a Wimbledon title
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1911
Wimbledon doubles champion with Max Decugis, the first French players to win a Championship event
1912
Wimbledon All-Comers singles final, lost to Arthur Gore, then 44
2
Olympic gold medals, indoor singles and doubles, Stockholm 1912
5
British Covered Court singles titles at Queen's Club, 1911 to 1922
No. 3
World ranking in 1919
André Gobert was born in Paris on 30 September 1890. A. Wallis Myers described him at 20 as "a volatile youth" with "a wonderful service" and decisive volleys. He won the French championship in 1911 and 1920, when it was open only to members of French clubs, and was at his most dangerous on wood: he won the French covered court title four times, the British Covered Court Championships at Queen's five times and the World Covered Court title in 1919.
He played Wimbledon eight times between 1910 and 1925. He won the All England Plate in 1910, and in 1911 he and Max Decugis took the doubles, beating the holders Major Ritchie and Tony Wilding in five sets in the Challenge Round. In 1912 he reached the All-Comers singles final and led Arthur Gore by a set and 5-3 before losing in four, and he and Decugis lost their doubles title to Herbert Roper Barrett and Charles Dixon. A week after beating Wilding at Queen's that spring he won both indoor gold medals at the Stockholm Olympics.
Military training and then war service, which Myers called "of the grimmest kind", stopped his tennis for seven years. He came back to win at Queen's again in 1920, ranked No. 3 in the world in 1919 and No. 5 in 1920, and lost the World Hard Court finals of 1913 and 1920. He played five Davis Cup ties for France between 1912 and 1922. He died in Paris on 6 December 1951.
| Wimbledon doubles 1911 | With Max Decugis: won the All-Comers final against Samuel Hardy and Cecil Parke 6-2, 6-1, 6-2, then beat the holders Major Ritchie and Anthony Wilding in the Challenge Round 9-7, 5-7, 6-3, 2-6, 6-2 |
|---|---|
| Wimbledon doubles 1912 | Lost the Challenge Round with Decugis to Herbert Roper Barrett and Charles Dixon 3-6, 6-3, 6-4, 7-5 |
| All-Comers final 1912 | Lost to Arthur Gore 9-7, 2-6, 7-5, 6-1, after leading 5-3 in the third set; according to Myers he won only one more game in the match. Gore went on to lose the Challenge Round to Wilding |
| All England Plate | Won the 1910 Plate, the event for players beaten early in the singles, beating P. M. Davson 6-4, 6-4 |
| Wimbledon | ||
|---|---|---|
| 1911 | Men's doubles | with Max Decugis |
Leading grass titles only: the grass majors, tour-level grass events since 1968 and the leading grass championships before 1968. † single source; ‡ sources disagree. Roll of champions
"Of all the giants ever seen under cover at Queen's he must rank first."
The person behind the player.
Wimbledon, 1912
Arthur Gore was 44 when he beat Gobert in the All-Comers final, "exactly twice as old as his French opponent". Myers called it something of a cat-and-mouse match. A fortnight later, in the Davis Cup at Folkestone, Gobert had his revenge.
Source: A. Wallis Myers, Twenty Years of Lawn Tennis (1921)Queen's Club, 1912
Defending his covered court title against Wilding, the Wimbledon champion, he lost the first two sets, won the next two and led 4-0 in the fifth. Wilding pulled back to four-all; Gobert held his nerve, won the ninth game and served out from 30. Myers wrote that he was "thereafter stamped as a great player". A week later he won the Olympic gold medal in Stockholm.
Source: A. Wallis Myers, Twenty Years of Lawn Tennis (1921)Stockholm, 1912
In the Olympic indoor final, with spectators perched on the rafters of the roof, he beat Charles Dixon in three sets after Dixon had won the first seven points and led 3-1. He served half a dozen double faults and two foot-faults and lost one service game to love. He and Maurice Germot also won the doubles, beating the Swedes Gunnar Setterwall and Carl Kempe.
Source: A. Wallis Myers, Twenty Years of Lawn Tennis (1921); OlympediaParis
In a World Hard Court final against Wilding at St. Cloud on a furnace of a day in late May, he lost the first two sets 6-3 under a fierce sun. He then draped his head in a bathing cap dipped in water and almost at once began to play better.
Source: A. Wallis Myers, Twenty Years of Lawn Tennis (1921)The war
Myers passed on a wartime story that Gobert came down after a mishap in a French reconnaissance aeroplane, half expecting to be in enemy territory, and landed among British officers who recognised the French champion at once and asked what training he was doing for the next Wimbledon.
Source: A. Wallis Myers, Twenty Years of Lawn Tennis (1921)Deauville
In a Davis Cup tie against the British on hard courts by the sea at Deauville, Gobert passed the time by taking photographs of the match before his own. As it dragged on, Myers noticed the suspense getting to him; he then lost in three sets to Major Kingscote, and France lost the tie by three matches to two.
Source: A. Wallis Myers, Twenty Years of Lawn Tennis (1921)Free membership: player news, the grass court Atlas, the rankings and the grass season calendar.
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