{"id":661793,"date":"2026-05-11T07:33:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-11T07:33:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/661793\/"},"modified":"2026-05-11T07:33:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-11T07:33:10","slug":"mal-anderson-tennis-great-mal-anderson-first-unseeded-player-to-win-us-open-mens-singles-title-passes-away-at-91-tennis-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/661793\/","title":{"rendered":"Mal Anderson: Tennis great Mal Anderson, first unseeded player to win US Open men\u2019s singles title, passes away at 91 | Tennis News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <img src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/mal-anderson-photo-from-ausopencom.jpg\" alt=\"Tennis great Mal Anderson, first unseeded player to win US Open men\u2019s singles title, passes away at 91\" title=\"Mal Anderson (Photo from ausopen.com) \" decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\"\/>Mal Anderson (Photo from ausopen.com)  Australian tennis great Mal Anderson has died at the age of 91, Tennis Australia confirmed on Monday. Anderson made history in 1957 when he became the first unseeded player to win the US Open men\u2019s singles title, then known as the United States Championships.Born and raised on a farm, Anderson began playing tennis on a dirt court before rising to become one of Australia\u2019s most respected players. During his career, he won the US Open singles title, three Grand Slam doubles titles and helped Australia win the <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/davis-cup\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" commonstate=\"[object Object]\" frmappuse=\"1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Davis Cup<\/a> twice.  <\/p>\n<p> Watch<\/p>\n<p> Indian tennis star Shrivalli opens up on injuries &amp; comeback journeyHis 1957 US Open triumph was especially memorable because he defeated three seeded players and lost only two sets throughout the tournament despite entering unseeded.After retiring from professional tennis, Anderson stayed closely connected to the sport and became a mentor to several young Australian players, including former world number one Pat Rafter.Rafter paid an emotional tribute after hearing the news.\u201cI was really sad to hear of Mal&#8217;s passing. He was one of those people who helped shape my tennis from very early on,\u201d Rafter told news agency AFP.\u201cHe was a true legend of the game, but more importantly he was a terrific bloke -\u2013 humble, generous with his time and always happy to help younger players along.\u201dRafter also spoke about the personal impact Anderson had on Australian tennis players across generations. He added, \u201cTennis in Australia has lost one of its greats, and a lot of us have lost a mate and mentor. I feel very lucky to have known him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mal Anderson (Photo from ausopen.com) Australian tennis great Mal Anderson has died at the age of 91, Tennis&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":661794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[150908,244633,49,48,7636,244634,244631,82,593,244632,166423,244635,2084],"class_list":["post-661793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-australian-tennis","tag-australian-tennis-history","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-davis-cup","tag-grand-slam-doubles-titles","tag-mal-anderson","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-tennis-greats","tag-tennis-legend","tag-tennis-mentor","tag-us-open"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=661793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/661794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=661793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=661793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=661793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}