South African Frew was the outstanding doubles player of his generation and was no slouch in singles competiions either. On the court, there was no mistaking which player was Frew Donald McMillan. He was the one wearing his trademark white driving cap and hitting blistering ground strokes off both sides with two hands. While major singles championships eluded him, major doubles championships did not. He won ten, five each in men’s and mixed doubles competition.
Frew won three Wimbledon men doubles titles all in straight sets from 1967 to 1978. He earned his first in 1967 over Aussies Roy Emerson and Ken Fletcher, and did so in exceedingly impressive fashion – never losing a set and McMillan never lost a service game. He won a second title in 1972 over the American duo of Stan Smith and Erik Van Dillen, and the last in 1978 over the powerful partnership of John McEnroe and Peter Fleming. He captured the French Open in 1972, dropping his only set in five in defeating Chile’s Patricio Cornejo and Jaime Filol. The 1977 US Open victory was achieved in two sets with remarkable ease over American Brian Gottfried and Mexico’s Raul Ramirez.
It would be to totally mis-represent his tennis career to suggest Frew couldn’t play singles. He played in 38 Grand Slam singles events first playing in 1961 at Wimbledon and last at the first US Open at Flushing Meadows in 1978. His best Grand Slam results both came at the US Open reaching the quarter finals in 1972 and the last 16 in 1976. Arguably his greatest singles result was reaching the final of the 1970 South African Open where he narrowly lost in four sets to world number 1, Rod Laver, the Federer - Nadal - Djokovic of his day.
This remarkable career was recognised when Frew MacMillan was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newort, Rhode Island in 1992.
He now lives in Bristol with wife, Sally, and remains involved with the sport working as a tennis commentator for Eurosport and BBC Radio 5.