Lawn Tennis SOUTH ISLAND JUNIORS Match Against Otago

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28541, 21 March 1958, Page 5

Lawn Tennis SOUTH ISLAND JUNIORS Match Against Otago

One of the noticeable weaknesses in New Zealand lawn tennis, as well as in some other sports, is the number of junior players who show great promise but who fail to improve past a certain stage and who do not develop into champion senior pl Vers as expected. Possibly one of the reasons for this is lack of hard play with players stronger than themselves. The chairman of the management committee of the Canterbury Lawn Tennis Association (Mr G. E. R. Atkinson) said this week: ‘‘We have brought the juniors along to a certain stage and from there they cannot improve further without big games.” Tomorrow, a team of juniors from various parts of the South Island will meet an Otago senior team at Dunedin, and this is the sort of match that will now benefit these juniors. In the original selection for this team of six boys and six girls, six Canterbury players were included but since then three— G. Judge, B. Aldridge and Miss C. Smith—have dropped opt for various reasons, leaving G. Moss A. Browne and Miss L. Mardon from Canterbury. Moss and Browne are members of the province’s Slazenger Shield junior team and Browne, who comes from Ashburton, recently won the Mid-Canterbury championship. Miss Mardon is a member of the Howe Shield team and a senior club player in Christchurch.

If this contest is successful it will probably become an annual practice to select a South Island junior team to play a senior provincial side. The South Island junior team is:—

Boys:—G. Davidson (North Otago), W. McAuley (Otago), G. Moss (Canterbury), K. Dunn (Otago), G. Birley (Otago), and A. Browne (Canterbury). Girls:—Diane Souter (South Canterbury), Denise Souter (South Canterbury), R. Jones (Southland), M. Dunbar (Otago), S. Kennelley (Otago), and L. Mardon (Canterbury).