LAWN TENNIS TALKS

Evening Star, Issue 19763, 13 January 1928, Page 2

LAWN TENNIS TALKS

mils MALLORY M AMERICAN METHODS [Special Interview, Exclusive to ‘ Evening Star,’ by Mrs Satteeih waite.] No. yi. Quite one of the most determined characters that I have ever met is Mrs Mallory—“ Molla,” as she is familiarly known to her many friends. There has never been anyone who has concentrated her life so entirely upon tenuis as sho has done, and she has achieved a marvellous success as the result of her perseverance. She is a living example to all young players of what an iron determination to succeed can do. Without having any especially brilliant strokes or any notably outstanding feature in her game, she has placed herself at the very top of women’s lawn tennis. To-day she is placed first in America in a ranking which includes Miss Wills and Miss Hyan; and her victory over the latter in the American championship last year, when she was 4-1 down in the final set, was quite one of the best things that she has ever done in all her long tennis career. She may be determined to the point of grimness on the court, but she is always ready to Hash her white teeth at you in a cheery smile as soon as the gaine is over. Shq? has played a great deal of lawn tennis in England and France, as well as having a 'oug list of triumphs in America; and she is always the first of the American team to arrive each summer in England, when she plays regularly through all the big tournaments up to Wimbledon. Mrs Mallory is a tremendous believer in constant tournament play. As she says herself; “If I don’t keep going in a tournament pretty often i get slack and seem to take no interest; i must lie playing competitive tennis all the time to keep my game up to the mark. 1 don’t mind 1 'etting up ’ for a day or two sometimes, but 1 don’t care for a Jong series of mere practise games before any big event; 1 prefer to play in tournaments right up to the end of the week before.” I asked her what stroke she found most useful to her. She smiled; “ Well, I guess my forehand drive, because that is really the most reliable thing i have got.” As a matter of fact. Mrs Mallory has a really lovely backhand stroke as well, and, what many other first-class players cannot*do, she can “angle” it all over the court at will. I told her this, and she - answered: “ Folks do say it is pretty useful sometimes, but 1 think 1 get on faster with my forehand. 1 don’t think the severity of the strokes really matter to any great extent so long as you are active and can keep on running. That is what i like to do, and 1 don’t ever get tired, while what you call hot weather over in England seems just lovely to me.”

Her tennis on the Riviera, when she was out two winters ago, was far below her usual form, and although she played very regularly in every tournament she was never the Mrs Mallory that we ail know in the States, or for that matter in England either. She is perfectly built for tennis, and with her slight figure is always “ fighting fit.” i asked her one day if she trained much for her big matches. She told me: “ No; I just keep on running, and that seems to do the trick for me all right without having to bother much about special dieting and all that sort ot thing. Ido believe wo Americans take our practise games more seriously than all your girls do over in England,” she went on, “Why, in America lots of us get out and practise every day for two or three hours at the same stroke, or maybe we get someone to keep serving to us all the time. Over here you seem to play just ordinary practise games, and don’t go in lor much actual practising of strokes.” I told her that I did not think our ideas of practice had been_ quite t so much developed as in America. She agreed heartily. “But I do think,” she went on, “ that yon certainly have got some fine girls coming on just now —that little Betty Nuthall, for .instance, Miss Bennett, Miss Ridley, and ever so many more; they seem to have got the idea of the game just right, and they seem at ease wherever they are, volleying, base-line play, anything—that’s what it ought to be.” Mrs Mallory is curiously enough very little of a volleyer herself, and most of her victories have been won entirely from the base line. Added to this, she has a very medium-paced overhand service, so that one can realise what a good tactician and a great fighter she must be to have made herself the very prominent place in women’s tennis that she holds to-day. “ I don’t ever reckon to win my matches very quickly. 1 can get around the court as long as most people, and when they begin to tire X usually find I am getting fresher myself. I don’t mind how much 1 run, and I do mean to make my opponents run, too. If you can keep people on the move all the time yon are bound to get them in the end unless yon get tired first. And that’s where i am lucky, I guess, because X never do.” Mrs Mallory, of course, will be at Wimbledon this summer as present champion of America, and there is no doubt that she will be a very welcome figure on the centre court, where she has by now become such a familiar figure with the English crowd.