TENNIS

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16583, 16 November 1921, Page 3

TENNIS

FIXTURES. New Zealand Championships.—December 27, 28, 29 and 30, at United Courts, Christchurch. Wilding Memorial Challenge.—Auckland v. Canterbury, at Christchurch, January 2 and 3. The grass-court season at United is in full swing and the week day attendance is growing steadily. Miss Annette Kellerman and her sister have played during the week in ladies’ and combined doubles. Owing to the rank state of the grass following on the persistent rains of October, several of the Courts are showing decided signs of wear. Very good entries have been received for thei Club handicap competitions, the amount in hand being £ls, although the highest entry fee in any event was Is 6d. In every event except tho ladies’ doubles there are sufficient entries to enable first and second grade competitions to hei held. Some very good form has been shown already by the players selected to practise for the Wilding Memorial Shield. A second challenge for the Shield has been received from the Waikato Association, which suggested December 31 for the match; but this date cannot be given a 3 the Auckland Challenge is already fixed to follow the championships. Tho Match Committee will meet this evening to decide the matter, and incidentally to apjmint two Canterbury members to act with the secretary of the New Zealand Association (Mr D. Murray Kean) in the management of tho tournament. Extraordinary keenness is being shown by those who are in the running for inclusion in the Wilding Memorial Shield team, and quite a lot of discussion is afoot as to the respective merits of the players. There can be no doubt that the competition has infused new life into the men’s play and the four places in the team will be highly coveted. G. Ollivier has to play each of the other aspirants for inclusion, so that some very interesting games ought to be sben at* United in the next week or so. The Avonside Courts are looking in first-class order. One of the courts has just been top-dressed, and the pavilion has been painted, adding considerably to the appearance of the courts. The membership is large, and there are one or two promising players among the youths. A club tournament will be in full swing in another week’s time. I here will be the Muray trophy, a combined handicap, as well as ladies’ and men’s doubles. To-day the ladies are playing) a match against Rangiora, and next Wednesday there will be a match against Malvern. but as the Avonside ladies are much too strong for the Malvern visitors the match will very likely be progressive. Mondays. Wednesdays and Fridays appear to'be off days on the courts, but on Tuesd;’. .s and Thursday it is almost necessary to arrange a set beforehand. The cabled announcement this week tnat A. E. Beamish and Mrs Darcombe have become professionals in connection with the Roehampton Club, is of much interest tcPthe many friends that Beamish made during his two visits to Christchurch. Beamish is properly regarded as the world’s most stylish player, his stroke production, especially in backhand drives, being extreme-

ly fascinating to watch, although his overhead work is lacking in aggressiveness. Beamish was a member of the British Isles Davis Cup team, headed by J. C. Parke, that lifted the Cup from Australasia in 1912, at Melbourne, and it was after that match that he first visited Christchurch. His second visit was at the end of 1919, with A. H. Lowe, after tho failure of the British Isles team to wrest the Cup from Australasia in Sydney. Geoff Ollivier, of Christchurch,6 beat Beamish on both of his visits to New Zealand. Mrs Darcombe, as a singles player, has had the misfortune to have been eclipsed by that delightfully polished player, Mrs Lambert Chambers, but Mrs Darcombe is a strong individualist, and a very clever tactician, especially in doubles, where she has always been in the front rank in England. The‘most significant fact about the announcement seems to be that English tennis players are determined to go in .for first-class coaching, and the value of such a policy can hardly be overestimated. New blood has been wanted in English tennis for a long time, and to New Zealanders this will be apparent in considering the surprising successes that F. M. B. Fisher has had at Horne. The game there has required speeding up and the infusion of new blood into, the game. The engagement of professionals of the calibre of Beamish and Mrs Darcombe suggests that the younger players are to be brought under their tutelage, to take the place of the good old stagers who

have somehow managed to keep their place in the front rank. On this subject another quotation from Tilden may not be amiss. “England, ’he writes, “ has but to interest her youth m tho game to hold her place with the leaders. I believe it will be done. I look to see groat advances made in tennis among the boys in England in the uext few years. I believe the game v. ill change to conform more to the model n not attack. England will never be the advanced tennis-playing country her colonies are, for her whole atmosphere is one of conservatism in sport. Still her game will change. Already a slight modification is at work. Ihe next decade will see a big change coming over the style of English tennis. The wonderful sporting abilities of the Englishman, his ability to produce his best when seemingly down, ana mean that no matter how low the ebb to which tennis might fall, the inherent abilities of the English athlete would always bring it up. I sound pessimistic about the immediate future. T am not, provided English boyhood is interested in the game.”^ <c On the point of physique. writes “Austral” in the Sydney “Referee,’ “it ig time, I think, one should express one’s convictions as to women’s part in lawn tennis. In Sunday’s cables came a story of the new find in English lawn tennis. Miss M Kane ha> won the covered court championship, ‘beating Mrs Satterthwaite by two sets to love,’ though one scarcely supposes that the lady won two love sets. She is hailed as the coming champion, having recently beaten Mi c s Ryan, of California, at the Heddon tournament. She must, therefore, be very good. She is a product, it is said, of the scheme bv which the large city shops have their own sports grounds. 1 Her game is distinguished bv hard driving, clever volleying and wonderful pace when running back to retrieve seemingly impossible shots." The whole game clearly. Now that reads all right, and I am sure we shall all be glad if there is a new champion all British. But what I find :.;ult with i s the unqualified praise, just as if the lady were really on a par with men players. Of course, an expert will read ‘ wonderful pace in running back to retrieve seemingly impossible shots ’ as meaning wonderful for a woman player. But the general public. and the athletes we want to see come into lawn tennis will certainly sneer at a game written of as if women could really bo compared with men. Some time back we heard a lot of plain rot from critics about Mdlle. Lenglen, the champion of France and of the world. tYe were seriously told that probably only the first ten player 8 in the world could beat her. That, of course, was good journalism ; but it does a lot of harm to the game itself as a branch of athletics- I personally have ridden 120 miles on a push-bike in a day over difficult roads; I have run fifteen without distress; and have followed on the ball right through a game of 'Australian football. In none of these have I been so fully physically extended as in lawn tennis in a five set match. Dawn tennis suffers because many athletes will not take it seriously. The head of the Great Public Schools’ sports in Sydney was recently asked why the pupils were not allowed to play lawn tennis, aqd he answered, quite seriously, that it was only ‘ a society game.’ That is one of ihe reasons why we cannot get the game into the big schools. I would like to take that sportsmaster and get him to chase balls that I would put just far enough for him to run for, and would soon convince him that it was serious athletics; but I shall not got the chance. “ In my firm opinion firtft-class lawn tennis for women in singles is too severe,” the writer continues, “ just because they are not physically able to stand the strain, as men who are not strong are also unable to stand it. Witness for that the many breakdowns in the physique of the lady champions of Australia. Miss Phoebe Howitt, who from about 1895 to 1900 was the best player in Australia, was one of the finest women physically that ever stepped on to a court. She wao sturdy and well made. She retired rather early, and nt about forty she died cf heart failure brought on largely by undue exertion at lawn tennis. Miss Pay ten, the unparalleled champion of Australia, had to retire from all physical exertion for the same reason. We are told that Mrs Molesvorth recently had the same experience of a breakdown, though we hope and believe it is only temporary. Mdlle. Lenglen is now in the same case. She has done too much, and her physical excesses have laid her on tho shelf, temporarily or otherwise, at twenty-two. Of course there are exceptions, but there are tco many cases to allow one to approve of ladies playing too often or too continuously in championship singles. Doubles are all right. So for two j reasons one deprecates careless praise \ of women’s play. It is an excellent j thing for them, but it can easily b- ! overdone in singles. Also, as I said, : the athletes are warned off by the fea; | i that they will bo called nambv- ; pamby.” j “As we gain more information c: j the dramatic retirement of Mdlle. Suj ?;anne Lenglen in her match with the I American lady champion. Mrs Mallory, !it is impossible to overlook the fact ! that the French girl was not in a fit [ condition to give of her befefr at such a short interval after landing in the State* (says an English writer). “ Her extraordinary reception, the frantic manner in which all classes of Americans literally bombarded the distinguished visitor, the little rest she was given, and the fact that she was expected to develop tactics on the court far in advance of anything previously witnessed in the country, all militated against her success. And. after all, Mdlle. Suzanne is but a girl, highly strung, temperamentally unfitted to be singled out for a great national welcome, and her nervous system failed her. She is not a professional boxer, to whom this sort of thing is part of the life. She is a French girl, with all the characteristics of that volatile nation, and that she ‘ cracked * is not surprising. Once acclimatised and rested, she will yet prove that Mrs Mallory, or any other of her rivals, cannot yet take from her the glory she possesses of being the greatest lady player tho game has ever seen.”