A TENNIS MARVEL

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18446, 6 January 1922, Page 7

A TENNIS MARVEL

PATTERSON, THE INVINCIBLE. VICTORIAN CHAMPIONSHIP TOURNAMENT. The Victorian championship tennis tournament ended in a blaze of glory for G. L. Patterson. In singles, his ultimate triumph - had been foreseen right from his -first match against R. Neil (New South. Wales), in, the intor-State games. Against' P. ■’ O’Hara Wood, in the final, lie' started ( rather slowly, keeping to top 1 back line much more than usual, and he lost tho set. But in the second set tho champion put', on steam and- crowded in on the net, ' gathering in eight games in succession,’ and it was plain that he was the better man. - Patterson used a variety of shots against ; Wood, but the one that told most of all , was the hoavily-out slow ball that bounced and curled away in Wood’s right service - court. Too close to the net and too low . - to be killed outright, it caused Wood, after .< netting it time and again, to lose confidence. Toward the end of tile game one could see him playing it quite nervously—a new thing ’ for Wood—and, naturally, even less success- -a fully than in the earlier stages.’ " 1 Undoubtedly Wood played well, brilliantly often, and he stuck to his gun's pluckilv, ■ - but he was outclassed. It was a battleship 1 against a cruiser—the best of the cryisor %■ class undoubtedly—but the battleship nod superior armament, both offensive and de- j ■ fpnsive, and in this case perhaps superior * speed. At least, it had equal speed. >■ To such a contest - there oould bo but v one end. It came dramatically in the v fourth set. Patterson does not play to fho gallery, but he clearly hag an instinct ’’ for the dramatic and finished the match, * as ho bo often does, with a perfectly unt.liveable terrific service to the left court, U. which Wood never even had time to move ’ toward. SPEED TACTICS. . One of tho veterans present at the doubles * final who has seen as much first-class tennis as anyone in Victoria, summed up the position correctly when lie said, “Patterson - won , both the singles and the doubles.” Seventy- '{ five poroent. at least expected Brookes icnd , t>Hera Wood. to. win. Their form this t year and the indifferent showing- made by Patterson and Hawke’s in their earlier matches justified the opinion. But, Pat. torson has grasped the situation, and as- ; suming that Brookes does not, sight the very fast stuff like he did he deliberately, made ’ game as fast as possible, hitting every ball as hard as he oould hit- it to and • at Brookes and talking all the nsks. He' served six double faults, all hit to Brookes’ >. court, but he hod to keep on - the pres- - sure. To slacken up and make sure of, the second serve would often have saved that particular point, but it would have ik been a dislocation of the general-plan of campaign. . Patterson has rarely been seen to better . advantage. To use a hackneyed phrase for - ' once correctly, Jie “dominated 1 -the game,”.* even as Brookes used to do. It was he who ( called the tune throughout; tho others bad ” to dance to his piping. Intermixed 1 ’with ; tlie brute force of his drives’ and smashes-, wore crafty tosses always directed over Brookes’s head, which tosses, or the ever present -threat of them, kont Wood from, getting right in to the net. for fear of,’ having to run round behind his partner. ■ The result was that Wood scarcely got a*’ shot all day; he was kept too far. HAWHES’S FINE SHOWING. ‘ I T Hawkos played brilliantly, partly 1)008X110 it is easy to play well when one’s' partner q; is playing like Patterson was plating, buS s more because hp was—or seemed'to be*--’ much closer in to the bet as a general rule , than ho usually is. This let him -vollev ■ down, instead of ■ up, in which' lies the' difference between attack and defence! This change of position also deemed to be just.the cure for the lack of combination, between him smd Patterson, so noticeable in,their earlier games. If it was tho result of a preconceived plan, it is just another triumph of head work. One feature of Hawkes’s game that cannot pass unnoticed was his beautiful low volleying, off his backhand, 1 of O’Hara Wood’s cross-court-returns v of service; He hardly missed one. His service also had Brookes in great trouble. O’Hara Wood was kept quiet by the tactics of his opponents and the exigencies t»f the situation, but he played some lovely'; shots. Brookes was beaten fairly by-ths pane of Patterson’s’ shots, though he did -t, some wonderful work with his racquet ia(l taking them. Too often, however, it wad - /' drily to give Patterson a chance at tho net, wIt was not the case of a veteran “lagging 1 - Superfluous oh, the stage.” Had Patterson not forced tho pace—-had the game been played at a dower “tempo”—Brookes, mg a certain lack of sting in hia service, would still have been a great player. It was just that extrji bit of pace that must come when a .player of Patterson’s class . and physique simply hurls himself 'on to * the bail and gets in that troubled him. Such a hit calls for a lot of taking, and tho eyes of youth.