FRANK SHIELDS was the original tennis badboy.
With film star good lucks and a nonchalance that once saw him skip a Wimbledon final, Shields left a huge imprint on the sport during the 1930s.
A New Yorker through and through, Shields reached the final of his home tournament at the US Championships, which would later become known as the US Open, in 1930.
The following year, Shields reached the Wimbledon final but did not take to Centre Court for the final, supposedly due to an “ankle injury”.
As reported by the Telegraph, however, cultural critic Jeffrey Hart once claimed of the 1931 showpiece: “This was a murky episode, in which legend has it that Shields was busy investigating the attributes of a matched pair of French countesses.
“The truth is probably that he had a badly twisted leg from his previous match with [Jean] Borotra – though the explanations are not mutually exclusive.”
Shields went on to marry three times, with all three of his wives being wealthy heiresses.
His second was a Spanish princess, Marina Torlonia di Civitella-Cesi, with whom he had two children.
In total he had five children with two different women, and among his grandchildren is American actress and socialite Brooke Shields – who would go on to marry Andre Agassi in 1997, their marriage lasting two years.
The vast majority of Shields’ successes, at least on the tennis court, came in the 1930s, when he peaked at No2 in the world.
Much has been made of this year’s controversially revamped US Open mixed doubles event, which saw Carlos Alcaraz partner Emma Raducanu at Flushing Meadows.
But in 1950, a grizzled veteran by this point, Shields partnered Hollywood A-lister Ginger Rogers in the mixed event at the US Open.
Rogers, an Academy Award-winning actress more used to recreational matches at country clubs than Grand Slam tennis, partnered Shields – although the glamorous pair were eliminated in round one at Forest Hills.
Per the Telegraph, Budge Patty, who reached world No1 that year, believed that Shields’ motives for partnering Rogers went beyond mere forehands and backhands.
Patty said: “There was only one reason why Frank would have been playing with her.”
Shields enjoyed a taste of the high life alongside Rogers, but couldn’t match her exploits on the silver screen.
The tennis lothario did attempt a career in cinema, appearing in several films during the 1930s, albeit with little commercial success.
Fred Astaire he was not.
Shields went on to be inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1964, but while his quality was not in doubt, his reliability often was.
In 1933 he was not selected at all for the Davis Cup, despite being the No1-ranked American at the time.
And two years on from missing the Wimbledon final, Shields went AWOL after the 1933 French Open.
Amazingly he was later discovered at sea, armed with nothing but the tuxedo on his back.
Hart wrote of the episode: “He had accompanied some friends on the boat train to Le Havre, a party all the way, and woke up at sea on the Warren Harding with no money, only his tuxedo.”
Shields struggled with alcohol in his latter years and he eventually died in 1975 aged 65, sadly succumbing to a third heart attack.
His legacy is a complex one, but Shields will forever remain one of the most intriguing stars in American tennis history.
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