LAWN TENNIS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18464, 27 January 1922, Page 9

LAWN TENNIS

Bt -Smash. Owing to the heavy drizzling rain which fell on Saturday it was impossible to re sumo the A Grade matches, and also the C Grade games. On Saturday next the B Grade competition will ho continued. The association has decided that the B Grade matches in section 2, which were postponed from October 15, will be played on February 11. At the meeting of the Otago Lawn Tennis Association on Wednesday night a request was received from the Clyde Club on the subject of affliation, and it was decided to supply the desired particulars. The Canterbury Lawn Tennis Association has written to the local association suggesting February 11 as a suitable date for the annual representative match between the two provinces. This date has been approved by the Otago Association, provided a team can bo obtained for that date, and players will be selected this week for practice with a view to their inclusion.^ The probable date for the match against Southland is February 18, and a letter ,ias been despatched to the Invercargill Associated stating that it is presumed that Southland will be sanding a team of six men and six ladies. Interest is already being evinced in the forthcocrring Easter tournament, the big event of the year in Otago lawn tennis circles, and there are already indications that this year’s tournament will be of more than usual Interest. At the meeting of the association on. Wednesday night several preliminary matters in connection with the .tournament were discussed, and it was 5 decided to take the whole or the detail arrangements in hand at the next meeting. _ During the current season a number of improvements have been effected to the courts and also to the pavilion accommodation; and these should bo much appreciated, not only by local competitors, but also by the visitors. In view of the increased entries which this popular tournament has been commanding for eomo years past, it is rather a pity that some system of “seeding” the draw could not be devised by the association. I notice that the English Lawn Tennis Association is considering the application of this principle to some of the larger tournaments at Home, and there seems to bo a good deal to be said in favour of the proposal. No doubt the laws governing_ the game will one day be amended in this direction, and this will put out of court those “sticklers” who would object to the proposal. Entries for the Auckland provincial championships, which are to be held on the Parnell lawns on January 28 and 30, closed on Wednesday. The groat attraction this year is the Horn Gold Cup, donated for the men’s championship singles. This cap is of solid gold, and it cost 200 guineas. Accompanying it is a miniature gold cup, the main trophy being held for the season by the winner, and the replica becoming his property. Never in the history of Neiw Zealand lawn tennis has such a valuable trophy been offered, and keep competition is anticipated. “London was ‘tennis-mad’ last summer,” states Miss Eleanor Gunson, of Auckland,' who recently returned to New Zealand.. “The public courts in every park and garden were crowded from dawn to dark. No matter in what direction you turned there were girls and man playing tennis, and so great was the increase in the number of players that at one period it was impossible to buy tennis balls.” In the opinion of J. B. Hawkes, the young Victorian representative in the Davis Gup team, which recently returned from America. Australia will not be the equal of America in lawn tennis until the younger players of the commonwealth are given more encouragement. Hawkes considers that the success of America was due to the fact that the game is given every encouragement in that country. Since his return from the tour abroad Hawkes haa shown a decided improvement in his game. Ho was defeated in the semi-final round of the recent Victorian Championship meeting by G. L. Patterson, but he went down in great style before 1 the overwhelming tactics of the champion. On Hawkes rests the future supremacy of Australia as a lawn tennis power. He is the youngest player of note in the commonwealth, and will probably participate in his second Davis Cup match next year. In the M.C.C. autumn tournament, and at the Geelong Easter meeting, Hawkes should again bo s«.en to advantage. It will he only a matter of time before he gets into the final round of a Victorian championship. According to the New York World W. T. Tilden does not expect to visit England this year to defend the title of world s lawn tennis champion, which he has won at Wimbledon for two years in succession. "Much as I would like to try for the title at Wimbledon again,” Tilden told an interviewer, "I feel that in view of the strenuous season in prospect her© the risk would be too great/’ Tilden added that during the coming season he looked for more determined competition for the Davis Cup, If this report is correct it will be disappointing < news for the English Lawn lennis Association, but in view of the recently cabled statement that Tilden was willing to play through the preliminary rounds at Wimbledon it is a little difficult to understand. Perhaps the decision of the English governing body to break away from the‘'established procedure of the past has caused the champion to change his mind. There can bo no doubt about “the strenuous season in prospect” ip America; but the fact that Tilden appears to have every chance of winning the Wimbledon and the American championships for the third year in succession will undoubtedly bo a powerful inducement' to him to visit England again this year. If he again fVins the double” he will enormously strengthen his position as the greatest lawn tennis champion the world has ever seen. Mr S. Hardy, the captain of the U.S.A. P av ‘ 3 _ Gup team in Europe and Australasia in 1920, -winner of the Pacific Coast Singles, California, 1894 and 1886, and U.S.A. Clay Court- Singles, 1917, was in England recently on a business trip. “Lawn tennis is booming as it has never done before, and to my own personal knowledge there are 'no fewer than 4000 hard courts —and probably more—in course of construction in America,” said Mr Hardy to a London newspaper representative. “The Kinsey brothers, of San Francisco, are the most improved doubles team in America. Roland Roberts, also of ’Frisco, is a coming champion. Willis Davis, who visited Wimbledon in 1919, when he was defeated by R. V. Thomas, the Australian, in the fourth round, has deteriorated. The most improved player in States is Wateon Washburn, - thanks to his daily practice throughout the tour of the Davis Cup team in Australia with W. T. Tildon and W. M. Johnston.” After discussing in some detail the American ranking - list, “ Austral,” in the Sydney Referee, states that there remain two interesting questions: Why were Shimidzu, Anderson, Todd, Hawkes and Peach not ranked? And where would they be ranked? S-uroly the Davis Cup contests should all have been regarded as contests qualifying for ranking, and they only have Jo be ia throe. As to their position, clearly J. O. Anderson and Shimidzu would be in the first 10. Anderson could scarcely be placed behind Richards, oven though Johnston beat him, as well as Shimidzu and Kumagae. He beat Tilden and Williams, and ii .proved out of sight at the last Shimidzu would have to go well ahead of Kumagae. He was within two strokes of beating Tilden in straight sots in the Davis Cup challenge round. The defeats inflicted on him by Voshcll and Richards wore in matches not so important in his point of view. Fairly, one could not place Shimidzu and Anderson lower than fifth or sixth, if so low. Anderson beat Rio;; decisively. If Anderson goes into the first six, so would Patterson, and that makes ,our Davis Cup chances look good for next year, especially if Johnston drops out. THE DARWINIAN THEORY. TO TUB KDITOB. Sin, —I feel that a letter In your issue of January 24, by Mr Henry E. Campion, merits a few comments. Mr Campion says: “I do deny, and most emphatically, the proposition that evolution is true and that it is an axiom of science. Indeed, I assort that the Darwinian theory is out of date, unscientific, and illogical, unChristian and anti-Christian.” Formerly many of us, particularly in the scientific world, had considered the proofs of evolution quite obvious and unquestionable, and had based our calculations on this, but now that Mr Henry E. Campion has asserted that they are all wrong, and that wo are mistaken, well, that must be so. Mr Campion says that the Darwinian theory is un-Christian and anti-Christian. What if it is? Who has yet established the proofs of Christianity? The Spot that the Darwinian theory is anti-Christian does not rob it of its logic. Again, Mr Campion says that it is unscientific. Is this true? Perhaps it would be as well for Mr Campion to try to understand it before placing himself upon a pedestal to decide with such a degree of finality such a profound and ponderous question. He speaks of the truths of the infinite. What are they-? I am afraid that so for only the infinite mind of Mr Henry E. Campion has. succeeded in finding and grasping them;— I am, etc.. p mM Down** Wish.