Photo credit: Corleve/Mark Peterson
Winning a Grand Slam singles title is a tennis pinnacle.
Recently, we’ve seen several different woman scale the major peak.
Did you know that since the start of the 2020 season, 11 different women have raised Grand Slam singles silverware?
When a courageous Madison Keys dethroned two-time defending champion Aryna Sabalenka 6-3, 2-6, 7-5 in an inspirational Australian Open final showdown, she not only won her maiden major, she lost the unofficial title of Best Player to Never Win a Major.
Several fabulous women champions never won a Grand Slam singles title.
Here are my picks for the Greatest Women Players Who Never Won a Classic Major Title.
Elizabeth Ryan
Elizabeth “Bunny” Ryan was a tremendous player of the early 20th century. She is most well known for having the most combined majors at Wimbledon in Singles, Doubles and Mixed Doubles with 19 combined majors before Billie Jean King broke her record in 1979.
Ryan’s most famous and probably greatest doubles partner was the legendary Suzanne Lenglen. Ryan, according to descriptions, in my opinion, did not have overpowering groundstrokes. She used the chop quite often but was a fantastic volleyer who reached three finals of the majors. They were at Wimbledon in 1921 and 1930 and at the US Nationals in 1926.
According to the Bud Collins History of Tennis and tennis historian Andrew Tasiopoulos, Bunny Ryan won 192 singles titles and an astounding amount 662 total titles. Aside from the singles titles she won 255 doubles titles and 214 mixed doubles titles. Bunny Ryan was a championship machine.
To put this record in perspective, Margaret Court, who some considered the greatest women’s player ever won a “mere” 414 total titles, according to the Collins History of Tennis. I do believe that Court has won over 200 singles titles so the figure is a bit higher than 414.
Nevertheless, it still pales in comparison to Elizabeth Ryan’s total of 662.
Rosie Casals
I have always enjoyed the play of Rosie Casals. She is solid in every aspect of the sport and had a very effective serve, despite not being of great height. Her second serve was excellent.
Rosie Casals had a very strong volley and a good overhead. She had good mobility around the court. Her smash was so strong that the legendary Pancho Gonzalez, according to his children, would permit Casals to take overheads when they played mixed doubles together—a rarity as Gonzalez often insistent on taking smashes himself playing doubles.
Casals won many tournaments in her career but perhaps the tournament that stands out the most is her victory in the 1973 Family Circle Cup on clay. It was the first tournament of the Virginia Slim Women’s Tour. Casals won it by defeating Billie Jean King in the semi-finals and Nancy Richey in the finals.
Margaret Court was also in that tournament but was defeated by Richey also in the semifinals. Clearly this was a very strong field and considering it was the beginning of the Women’s Tour, one of the most important tennis tournaments ever. At worst you can call it a Landmark Tournament that changed tennis history.
Clearly one of Casals strengths was her serve and volley game. The grass in those days was ideal for this type of game. Casals showed how dangerous she was in the majors on grass by reaching the finals of the US Open in consecutive years in 1970 and 1971.
Overall her winning percentage on grass for her career was 68.4% which is the highest for her on any surface. While grass was by percentage her best surface, it was not by much. On hard court it was 66.3%, on clay it was 67.5% and on carpet it was 62.7%. This consistency shows her ability to play on all surfaces well. Casals lost to Margaret Court in 1970 but not before taking her to the final set in the last match for Court to complete her Grand Slam.
Rosie also lost to Billie Jean King in straight sets in 1971 by a score of 6-4 7-6. These are losses to two all-time greats who had the perfect game for a grass surface. Hardly embarrassing and very competitive matches.
Rosie Casals, according to sources from 1966 to the end of her career won 20 tournaments. Perhaps her best year was 1973 when she won three tournaments including the Family Circle Cup. That year superb 1973 season, she won 84 matches and lost 28 for an excellent percentage of 75%. Some sources have her winning 29 tournaments in her career.
From 1966 to 1977 Casals was in the Top 10 in the world with her best finish at number 3 in 1970. She was a top player for many years.
I have Rosie Casals winning, from 1966 on, 20 tennis tournaments. Her career winning percentage is an excellent 65.8%.
Elena Dementieva
Often when we watch an elite world-class player, the average person will find it hard to identify with the incredible feats that they seem to almost magically perform on the court.
How can a regular person identify with players who can serve 120 mph and hit shots with rocket speed? We can marvel at what they all do.
Naturally the average sports viewer, because of this, often identify with the underdog, the player or team that seems to have little chance but often prevails in the end.
Elena Dementieva is clearly a gifted talented player. She has a good height for a tennis player at 5 feet 11 inches tall. She runs like the wind, her reflexes and groundstrokes on both sides seem to be almost perfect.
Yet for much of her career she often had a problem with her serve, probably due to a shoulder injury she had early in her career. Even after she recovered from the injury, the serve would sometimes betray her at the worst possible time. This would allow the average viewer to see Dementieva as the underdog—because of that one suspect stroke in an otherwise impeccable game—even though the reality is she was one of the top players in the world.
Yet despite these problems with her serve, she usually won the match. Often you can’t help but admire the tenacity that Dementieva would display when so many of her service games would become real battles—between herself and the opponent and herself and her serve. I wondered what would have happened if Dementieva had developed a more effective serve? She briefly did just that working with Wimbledon champion and serve coach Richard Krajicek, but unfortunately did not sustain that partnership.
The differences in the top levels are often very slight. If a player improved their range perhaps by a few inches on many points, they may win far more tournaments. Dementieva, with a good serve in finals, may have allowed her to win far more tournaments and perhaps a good number of major titles. But I suppose you can make that case about any elite player.
Elena Dementieva in her career won 16 tournaments, including two Tier 1 titles. These 16 tournaments won do not include perhaps the biggest tournament that she won, which was the 2008 Olympic Gold Medal in tennis. So in actuality Dementieva won 17 tournaments in her career—and remember she was going up against some of the best of the best of her era including Serena Williams, Venus Williams, Lindsay Davenport, Maria Sharpaova, Kim Clijsters, Justine Henin, Svetlana Kuznetsova and Amelie Mauresmo to name a few.
Some may even consider the Olympic Gold Medal to be a major. In fact Venus Williams has publicly said she values her four Olympic gold medals as much or more than any Grand Slam singles title. But clearly, the gold medal is not exactly equal to one of the classic majors in tennis.
Dementieva retired from tennis at a fairly young age in 2010, the year she would be 29. I’m certain she would have added to her excellent tournament record if she continued.
During her last year in Professional Tennis she won two tournaments and had a record of 69-18. She finished the year ranked in the Top 10 again at No. 9. Her career winning percentage was 66.89%. Elena Dementieva was in the Top 10 seven times in her career. She was simply a superb player with beautiful groundstrokes, she was also fast and fit.
Pam Shriver
The Pride of Baltimore, Pam Shriver, as with Elizabeth Ryan and Rosie Casals, was not only an excellent singles player but also superb in doubles. Shriver’s most famous doubles partner is Martina Navratilova, who is arguably the GOAT of Women’s Tennis in both singles and doubles.
Shriver was of the young tennis prodigies of the late 1970s along with Tracy Austin. At the age of 16 she reached the US Open final, losing to Chris Evert 7-5 6-4.
Shriver was an excellent serve and volleyer with great range at the net. She had flat and slice strokes. Shriver won 21 tournaments in her career and reached as high as No. 4 in the world. She was in the Top 10 for nine consecutive years.
Playing in an era that popped with legends including Chrissie Evert, Martina Navratilova, Steffi Graf, Monica Seles and Tracy Austin, Pam Shriver had a career winning percentage of an excellent 69.3%.
Karolina Pliskova
When you think of Karolina Pliskova, you think of her great serve. She had led the WTA in aces in a number of years.
Over her career she has won 17 tournaments, including two Tier 1 tournaments. She Was world No. 1 and reached the finals of two majors. Pliskova lost the final of the 2016 US Open to Angelique Kerber 6-3 4-6 6-4 and the final of the 2021 Wimbledon to Ash Barty 6-3, 6-7, 6-3.
A tall, powerful player who could dictate play against nearly any opponent on her best day, Pliskova’s career winning percentage is 63.43%.
Conclusion
Who is the Greatest Woman Player to Never Win a Grand Slam?
This is an extremely tough one. If you just examine just the numbers, no doubt that Elizabeth Ryan wins easily going away. Her numbers were great in every category. She won a massive number of tournaments, rarely lost and even gave superhuman players like Suzanne Lenglen an occasional run for the money.
According to Bud Collins History of Tennis, Ryan was in the World’s Top 10 eight times with a high ranking of No. 3 in 1927.
My only issue with Ryan is that her style with the chop groundstrokes would not do well today.
But we also must consider that if Ryan grew up today, she would learn a different technique. Ryan probably would be able to move around the court better due to better training and better knowledge of nutrition.
Still, for her time, with the small wood racquets, Ryan was one of the best players. No question about it.
In the Open Era, Elena Dementieva was in the year end Top 10 seven times before she retired at the early age of 29. As we pointed out: Dementieva achieved that remarkable run despite going up against legendary champions.
Dementieva also, from many observers’ perspectives won a major by winning the Olympic Gold Medal in 2008, an extremely prestigious title. I have heard some say that to them, the Olympic Gold Medal in tennis is more important than a major!
While that’s debatable, it is clearly important. Many said that Novak Djokovic, when he won the Olympic Gold Medal in 2024, finally capped the gap that was missing in his great career.
Rosie Casals was not only an excellent player but one of the pioneers of Women’s Tennis. A member of the Original 9 that formed the foundation for the WTA Tour, Casals won more tournaments than Dementieva and was, like Dementieva in two finals of majors where she performed admirably against iconic champions.
Rosie Casals was also in the Top 10 for 12 straight years.
Casal won 29 tournaments in her career which surpasses anyone on this list for the Open Era. Incidentally Rosie played prior to the Open Era which started in 1968. Frankly it makes no difference in examining her record since she was playing the strongest possible players prior to 1968 in Women’s Tennis.
In conclusion, I am going to split this up and say that Elizabeth Ryan is clearly No. 1 prior to the Open Era. Ryan may not have played the toughest tournament competition in every tournament during those days of lesser transportation but she still had a fantastic record. They did not have airplane travel we have now to quickly go to distance countries and places.
Elena Dementieva and Rosie Casals are tied for No. 1 for the Open Era onward.
For Casals I have included her record prior to 1968.
Third would be Hall of Famer Pam Shriver for the Open Era and fourth would be Karolina Pliskova.
The top players who have not won a major are in alphabetical order:
Rosie Casals, Elena Dementieva and Elizabeth Ryan.
Raymond Lee is a Tennis Now contributing writer, tennis historian and avid tennis player who lives in New York. He has written about tennis for more than three decades serving as a contributing writer for Tennis Week Magazine and TennisWeek.com. Raymond Lee joined the Tennis Now staff in 2010.
Check out Raymond Lee's Articles: The Greatest Over Age 30 Players of All Time, Star Turns: Top Tournament Performances in Tennis History, One for One: Who is the GOAT for One Match? Celebrating 50th Anniversary of John Newcombe's 1973 US Open Win, Why Novak Djokovic Can Win 30 Slams and Holy Grail: Why Winning the Calendar Grand Slam is Toughest Task in Sport and The Greatest Men Clay-Court Champions Of All Time