Jay Clarke won the European Winter Cup in Correggio with the British U14 team in 2012 when they beat Sweden 2-1 in the final. Clarke was able to contribute a victory in both singles and doubles. In the same year he was able to win two U14 tournaments of grade 1 and became number 1 in the European U14 rankings. With these successes, he secured the AEGON Junior Player of the Month award for May. In 2014 he was the UK's best junior player despite not training in the UK or receiving financial support from the UK tennis governing body . He was trained by his sister Yasmin.
Professional tour
Clarke made his professional tour debut when he was 15. He mainly plays in tournaments on the Future and Challenger Tour. So far, he has won three individual titles on the Future Tour.
Clarke came to Wimbledon for his Grand Slam premiere in 2017 . Together with his partner Marcus Willis , he received a wildcard for the double competition. There he sensationally made it into the second round with two 5-set successes in the first two rounds. In the second round they were able to beat the number 2 duo Pierre-Hugues Herbert and Nicolas Mahut . In the round of 16 he lost in three sets against the eventual finalists Oliver Marach and Mate Pavić . He celebrated his first title win on the Challenger Tour in Binghamton . In the final, he beat the top seeded Australian Jordan Thompson in just three sets . With this success he made it into the top 200 for the first time and with 175th place his best place in the world rankings to date .