Briton Alfie Hewett joins the Career Grand Slam Club

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Alfie Hewett joined an exclusive club when his Wimbledon wheelchair singles title completed his career Grand Slam.

Hewett, who had already achieved this feat in doubles, is only the fourth wheelchair player to win a Grand Slam singles title and the first Briton since Fred Perry in any category.

Here the PA news agency takes a look at the group he is joining.

Elite Group

Hewett’s 6-2, 6-3 victory over Spaniard Martin De La Puente followed last year’s Australian Open title, having also won the US Open four times and the French Open three times.

Shingo Kunieda is the only other player to achieve this feat in men’s wheelchair tennis. Dutchwoman Diede de Groot has won a women’s Grand Slam five times and Australian Dylan Alcott has won all four majors in the quad category.

Perry was the first of eight able-bodied men to achieve this feat at the 1935 French Championships – the predecessor of the French Open.

American Don Budge won a Grand Slam in a calendar year in 1938, as did Australian Rod Laver in both 1962 and 1969 – Laver’s compatriot Roy Emerson completed a career Slam in 1964.

Andre Agassi and the modern “big three” Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic have also won career Slam tournaments; Djokovic is the latest addition to the list in 2016.

American Maureen Connolly Brinker won a Grand Slam in women’s singles in 1953. Her compatriots Doris Hart and Shirley Fry Irvin also each won a career Slam in the 1950s.

Margaret Court completed her set at Wimbledon in 1963 and later won a Grand Slam tournament in 1970.

Billie Jean King, Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Steffi Graf, Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova are the other winners of a Career Slam in women’s singles.

The famous four

Hewett’s first title came at the French Open in 2017, followed by the US Open the following year. Since then, he has won at least one Grand Slam title every year – the French Open in 2020 and 2021, the US Open in 2022, the Australian Open in 2023 before defending his US title, and now his home tournament.

His success came two years after Kunieda’s emotional Wimbledon victory. The Japanese star won the other three majors in 2007, but Wimbledon only added wheelchair singles categories in 2016.

Kunieda completed the set with his 28th Grand Slam singles title, with 11 wins at the Australian Open and eight each at the French Open and the US. He announced his retirement in January 2023, having also won three Olympic titles, achieving a career Golden Slam – a feat only achieved by Graf, Agassi, Nadal, Williams, Alcott and De Groot.

For the latter, Saturday’s victory in the women’s wheelchair singles was her 15th consecutive Grand Slam singles title and her 23rd overall.

Alcott has won 15 Grand Slam quad singles titles and swept the board in 2021, just as he did in doubles two years earlier.

Double

Hewett is one of seven players to win a career Slam in men’s wheelchair doubles in 2020 before teaming with Gordon Reid to win a calendar year Grand Slam in 2021. Eight female players and five quad players have won career doubles Slams.

There were 25 Grand Slam winners in the able-bodied men’s category, 23 in the women’s category and 17 in the mixed doubles.

Hewett, Kunieda, De Groot and Alcott, along with Emerson, Court, Hart, Fry, Navratilova and Williams, are winners of Grand Slam tournaments in singles and doubles – Hart, Court and Navratilova have also won Grand Slam tournaments in mixed doubles.