WIMBLEDON SPRUCES UP FOR ANOTHER CHAMPIONSHIP

Auckland Star, Volume LXXVI, Issue 99, 28 April 1945, Page 17

WIMBLEDON SPRUCES UP FOR ANOTHER CHAMPIONSHIP

Americans Dominated World Tennis Spectacle At Last Gathering In 1939

THERE was an Associated Press dispatch in the paper the other day from London that probably escaped most eyes. It was only a couple of paragraphs and it wasn't about the war. It read: "They are sprucing up the tennis courts at Wimbledon in hopes of resuming international tennis tournaments this summer. "Eight courts already are in perfect condition and the others —some damaged by bombs—are being repaired. Two bombs fell on the club grounds last year, one at the entrance gate and the other near the centre court stands. Tentative plans call for an eight-day tourney some time this summer."

It was in 1939 that the last championship was held at Wimbledon. Looking back, it seems so long ago as to have been in another age. In 1940, it seemed that there would never be another Wimbledon, with the Queen in the Royal box and the finest players from the world over, immaculately garbed and scrupulous in their observance of inviolate traditions of etiquette, competing for the game's most prized honours on the most treasured piece of tennis turf.

Spirit Of Fair Play Saved In 1940 the bombs were falling about Wimbledon and the few Spitfire pilots to whom so many owe so much were fighting one of the decisive battles of the world in the sky above. It was a battle for the preservation of civilisation, and the winning of it preserved the civilised way of playing games and the spirit of Wimbledon, which is the spirit of Forest Hills and American fair play.

Had the. Spitfires failed there could not have been another Wimbledon, with the swastika flying from the masts. Tennis would still be played there, likely in a grandiose new stadium of massive proportions, but in an atmosphere as alien to Wimbledon's tradition as the martial goosestepping display at Berlin in 1936 was to the Olympic spirit.

The last championship at Wimbledon was completely dominated by Americans, who swept every title. Robert L. Riggs and Miss Alice Marble won the singles and paired to take the mixed doubles. Riggs won the men's doubles with Elwood Cooke, runner-up in the singles, and Miss Marble took the women's doubles with Mrs. Cooke.

Were the war over and Wimbledon able to resume on a full scale, the chances are that Americans would again be in the saddle, though John Bromwich and. Adrian Quist, of Australia, would be strongly in the running. It. is only in the United States that there has been any tournament competition during the war and that would give us a big advantage.

But there is little chance that the Wimbledon tournament will be conducted on ■ Anything more than a small scale this year, if it is held at all. Nothing like the wide foreign representation of old could be expected.

The leading players of this country, almost without exception, are in the fighting forces, and so are the Australians. Moreover, they have a job to do in the Far I ast, even if Germany should be finished off by summer. • • •

England to Start from Scratch Tennis in France will need a lot of reorganising and rebuilding, and England will have to start over again pretty much from rock bottom. She has no • players, to approach the stature of Fred Perry and Bunny Austin, who are in . the American Army, and it will require several years before she. can hope to develop any of international calibre. Following the first world war the United States, because the other

nations had suffered sueft heavier losses, refrained from challenging when competition for the Davis Cup was resumed in 1919. Whether we will remain out for a year again when Australia accepts challenges for the trophy, which she won in 1939 at Philadelphia, has yet to be determined.

But it is too early to be thinking about the Davis Cup at this time. There cannot be any competition for it before 1946 and it may be 1947 or later before the matches can be resumed.

International tennis of any kind is out of order right now. It is enough to see Wimbledon back in the news and to rejoice that the British are hopeful of being able to stage the most famous of all tennis championships again this year.