Canterbury Has Had Fine Nunneley Casket Teams

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28536, 15 March 1958, Page 5

Canterbury Has Had Fine Nunneley Casket Teams

TT is so long since the Wilding A Shield or Nunneley Casket, premier provincial trophies for lawn tennis in New Zealand, have been held by Canterbury that many who have followed the game here in the last decade probably do not realise that Canterbury had a long period of ascendancy with both. When the Canterbury women’s team challenges Auckland for the Casket next week-end, it will attempt to bring back a trophy that left the South Island in 1946. Canterbury has challenged a few times in recent years but has failed, often badly. The Nunneley Casket was presented for provincial competition to the Wellington Lawn Tennis Association in 1929 by Miss Kathleen Nunneley, the greatest of New Zealand’s women players. Wellington held the trophy tenaciously and it was not till the 1934-35 season that another province took • it and so began the period of Canterbury’s ascendancy. Canterbury had been confident in 1933 with a team comprising Misses D. Nicholls, then national champion, M. Wake, E. Rudkin, and T. Poole, It was beaten by 7 matches to 5 with the fate of the Casket not decided until the last match. The' 1934 contest was again close and playing in the last doubles, Canterbury needed a 6-0, 6-0 win. The Canterbury pair won the first set, 6-0, and led 4-0 in the second before it dropped the crucial game Win In 1935

A younger team of Misses T. Poole, M. Sherris, I. Poole and E. Rudkin was sent to challenge Wellington in 1935 and they brought the trophy back to Christchurch. Wellington had a very strong team captained by Miss Nicholls, which haa earlier repulsed a challenge from a good Auckland side. Canterbury led after the first day, allowed Wellington to even, and then went on to win.

xnese players, witn others, kept the Casket in Canterbury for five successive seasons when Canteroury tennis was strong. No matches were played in 1939-40, but in 1941 the Casket returned to Wellington. ’That was not the last Canterbury was to see of the trophy, for although challenges lapsed for the rest of the war, the province was again challenging Wellington in 1945. Mesdames K. Hart, D. Donnithorne and J. Adams and Miss M. F. Burrell (Canterbury), lost by 3 matches to 7 to Mesdames J Robb, J. McVay, Misses S. Cross and N. Fleming, with the matches on hard courts that the Canterbury players were not as used to as their opponents. But later in the season Wellington made a generous gesture

by taking the trophy on tour to play Canterbury at Wilding Park. The teams were to be the same except that Mrs L Hatherley, formerly Miss I. Poole, replaced tors,Adams for Canterbury, and Miss. M. Snelling replaced Miss Cross. Then just before the match began, Mrs McVay had to return to Wellington. Vfith the Wellington team thus weakened, Canterbury won by 6 matches to 4, with two doubles unfinished.

The same Canterbury team staved off challenges from Auckland (7-5) and Otago (9-3) to retain the trophy for the season. That was the end of Canterbury’s great period. Hutt Valley is in the records as the holder for the 1946-47 season—the first outside Wellington and Canterbury—then Wellington tor two seasons and Auckland ever since. 211111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111