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No.1 lady with racket, no longer occupied as such (5)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

evert

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'no 1' is the definition.
The definition suggests a singular noun which matches the answer.

'lady with racket no longer occupied as such' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'lady' could be 'eve' (I've seen this before) and 'eve' is located in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for evert that I've seen before include "Tennis champion" , "Chris --, female tennis star" , "Chris - - (women's tennis)" , "Former US World No 1 tennis player, b. 1954" , "arrange to have the wrong side out?" .)

I've seen this clue in The Independent.
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