OPEN TENNIS QUESTION

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 29067, 2 December 1959, Page 6

OPEN TENNIS QUESTION

Attitude Of Australia (N.Z. Press Association —Copyright) MELBOURNE, December 1. Australia’s attitude to open tennis would be decided next February, the president of the Lawn Tennis Association of Australia (Mr Donald Ferguson) said today. Mr Ferguson was commenting on a London report that Australia, the champion nation, had failed to reply to a questionnaire circulated by the International Lawn Tennis Federation on the amateur-professional problem. A special committee of seven would meet in Paris at the weekend to decide the future of the game, the report said. The federation chairman (Mr J. Eaton Griffith) was quoted as saying: “We have had 31 replies from federation nations—a most heartening response—but not one word from Australia, the Davis Cun holders. “We have replied to some of the questions.” said Mr Ferguson. “Our last meeting decided to recommend that players be allowed 250 days’ travel outside their own country each year. “We also recommended that players’ expenses should be fixes by individual countries, according to their own views,” he said. Under existing regulations, the expenses limit is £5 a day. “I don’t think an answer on the open tournament question is wanted urgently at this stage,” Mr Ferguson added.