New Zealand Tennis

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25081, 13 January 1947, Page 6

New Zealand Tennis

The second New Zealand lawn tennis championships since the war have just concluded in Christchurch and the tournament proved a great success in spite of the unseasonable weather. There was a prospect at one time of some members of the American Davis Cup team taking part in the tournament. This would, no doubt, have added to the already great public interest and would have provided New Zealanders with a yardstick to measure the present standard of play in this country against the standards of leading oversea tennis nations. At the same time, there is something to be said for a New Zealand cham-

pionship confined to New Zealand players. In other countries there is a continual round of tournaments through the summer and usually some in the winter as well. In New Zealand the annual championships are the only tournament where all the leading players gather and it is almost the only reliable guide for the national ranking of the players. The standard of play at this tournament was reasonably high, but not comparable with that of some former tournaments. It would be surprising, indeed, if it were. Like every other tennis-playing country, New Zealand is bound to show the effects of the war. Many young players who would now be in the forefront of the game have had their tennis development retarded by anything up to six years; many, of course, have been lost to the game altogether. Yet the play of the 24-year-old New Zealand champion, R. S. McKenzie, impressed strongly. Given the same opportunity as some other New Zealanders who have had the chance of playing oversea, there is every reason to believe he would do as well. It is up to the New Zealand , Lawn Tennis Association to give him these opportunities. It was a pity that the association Jet the undoubted difficulties deter it from active participation in last year’s Davis Cup competition. In J. E. Robson, one of the new doubles champions, and John Barry, the present junior champion, New Zealand has two young players of great promise; and there are others not far behind them in present skill and future potentialities. Although McKenzie and Miss Margaret Beverley retained their singles titles, the doubles all changed hands. This is a sign that New Zealand tennis is not stagnating. Five’of the six doubles champions have won national titles for the first time. Robson is the only one of the new champions who is really young in *a tennis sense, but all have years of good play ahead of them. Perhaps the most pleasing result of all was the success of Mrs J. Robb and her husband, R. V. Robb, in the mixed doubles. New Zealand tennis has had no more courageous or determined fighter than Mrs Robb, and no one more popular among both players and spectators. Tennis is p. game in which keen players tend to play “ on their nerves ”; but it is perhaps invidious to single out any competitors in this tournament for good sportsmanship. There were a few outward manifestations of nervous tension, but the great majority of the players showed the self-control that is expected on the sports field. They served the game well by helping to dispel the old prejudice against tennis as a game breeding selfishness and the “prima donna “ temperament