Senior B Grade Now Eliminated From Tennis Competitions

Southland Times, Issue 23942, 7 October 1939, Page 16

Senior B Grade Now Eliminated From Tennis Competitions

By

TOPSPIN

Many of the city and country tennis clubs have already had their opening days, and most of the remaining clubs have set down this Saturday to mark officially the opening of a new season. Since the start of daylight saving the weather has been ideal and during the evenings most of the courts in Invercargill have been well patronized. At the annual meeting of the Southland Lawn Tennis Association the delegates decided that the inter-club competitions in the Invercargill district be limited to three grades, A, B, and C, thus cutting out the senior B grade. It was contended that the competitions were too unwieldy last year, and that some of the players in C grade were not up to competition standard. There is no doubt, too, that as time goes on the number of tennis players enlisting for military service will make it increasingly difficult for clubs to field a full complement of men in their teams. Entries in the Invercargill competitions close today, and the draw will be made at the meeting of the management committee to be held on Monday evening. One alteration from previous years is that there will be match play on the Saturday of Labour Day weekend this year. APPEAL TO CLUBS It is difficult to say as yet how the various clubs ■will be affected this season as a result of the war, but the Southland Association has given a lead in this respect and has appealed to clubs to organize, and proceed with sport as usual, for the need for healthy outdoor exercise such as tennis, and maintaining physical well-being is never more essential than at such a time.

The- annual report, submitted by the Southland body recently, showed that the number 1 of players of affiliated clubs in the district had decreased from 1225 the previous season to 1186. The decrease is not very great, but it is disturbing if “it means that the game is scarcely holding its own in Southland. In view of this drop in members the application of the Collegiate Club for affiliation was no doubt welcome to the parent body. The Collegiate Club, situated in Forth street, has the use of four excellent concrete courts with a bitumen surface. The run-back at the south end could perhaps have been a little greater. It has, too, a deck tennis court, and nearby is a brick wall, which would be valuable to players as a volley board if the space in front were paved. The club had a membership of about 30 players in its first year, and it is expected that the number will be increased to nearly 50 this year. It is understood that the club intends entering one team in the C grade competition. Match play will improve the standard of tennis of the players considerably, and probably they will be qualifying for a higher grade next year. Delegates to the annual meeting of the Southland Lawn Tennis Association had considerable discussion on a remit

from the Waihopai Club before it was decided to reduce the affiliation levy of members of city clubs. It was contended that the association was financial enough, and there was no need to accumulate more funds unless for some definite purpose. ASSOCIATION COURTS There was again put forward the plea for weekly matches in all grades in the city, and for three-set matches. Obviously such a thing is unworkable unless, the pressure from club courts is relieved by doing what has frequently been advocated in these columns, the building up of a fund to provide the association with courts of their own. The reduction made ,is so negligible that tennis players would never miss it, yet if set aside it would, in a few years, grow to appreciable proportions. There would ultimately be a tennis centre of which the province might be proud, and the governing body of tennis would not have to go, cap in hand, to the leading clubs to ask periodically, for the use of courts for important fixtures such as tournaments and representative fixtures. The new executive has inevitably undergone changes, and, in passing, the writer would like to mention the work of the retiring secretary, Mr G. R. W. Barnes, who has frequently been approached for information about tennis matches in the past, and who has shown the same help to the Press as he has to the administration of the game. The suggestion to change the date of the Southland championships to the New Year was not. well received, and will, apparently, be held at Christmas as usual. The decision to hold a tournament during the evenings for C grade players is an excellent one, and if it meets with anything like the success of the same experiment by badminton players recently it will certainly be well worth-the effort.