LAWN TENNIS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVI, Issue 138, 10 December 1908, Page 7

LAWN TENNIS.

AUSTRALASIAN CHAMPIONSHIPS. By Telegraph.— Press Association.— Copj right SYDNEY, 10th September. The contests for the tennis championship of Australasia were continued today, with results as follows :—: — S. N. Doust (New South Wales) beat F. M. B. Fisher (Wellington, N.Z.) decisively, the scores being 6—3,6 — 3, 6—o,6 — 0, 6-3. Alexander (United States) beat Marsh. Dunlop (Victoria) defeated Doust. In the doubles, Wilding and Sharp were victorious over Parker and Grieg, the games ending 6—4,6 — 4, 6—3,6 — 3, 10 — 8. Referring to the Davis Cup competition, a writer in the Sydney Daily Telegraph remarks :—: — "Financially the undertaking was a great success. £1200 was taken during the progress of the game, evidence of the practical support given ; and not only will a sufficient sum fall 'to the share of the visitors to defray expenses, but the Australasian Association, for the first time in its history, will have ' adequate funds to attend to the thousand and one matters that claim its' attention. It will be enabled to establish the nucleus of a fund, which, when the Davis Cup does leave these shores, may be applied towards the expense of sending a representative team away .to recover it once more The element of finance must enter into any game, more or less, and it is undoubtedly the case that tennis in Australia has always been hampered for want of adequate funds to aid its development. "Tennis in this country has never yet commanded its proper share of public support, nor have its manifold attractions been understood or appreciated. That has been due to a variety cf causes, some domestic, but mainly because the general public has never seen championship tennis played, and so has not understood of what the game is capable. They were aware that tennis , is a feature at garden parties, and that in every suburb clubs had their courts, where players of more or less ability passed their afternoons with much enjoyment. That it could ever come under the category of a scientific and international game, which demanded skill and endurance of no mean order, and offered to the onlooker the most exhilarating of spectacular contests, passed their comprehension. And yet cricket is not judged by the standard' of its junior players. Becauso you do not watch the novice with much enjoyment, that is no reason why you should fail to appreciate Trumper. The same thing is true of every other branch of sport. But they are not judged by the standard of their inferior representatives, far f rdm it ; why, then, should people choose to regard tennis, as played by the enthusiastic if unskilled second-rater, us marking the highest development of the game, when in reality, as compared with that of the champions, it is, to use the homely simile, as different as chalk from •cheese."