LESSONS LEARNT AT WIMBLEDON

Ladies' Mirror, Volume 4, Issue 5, 2 November 1925, Page 37

LESSONS LEARNT AT WIMBLEDON

*3 y SUZANNE LENGLEN

THE FAMOUS “SUZANNE” IS “LEADING LADY” IN THE LAWN TENNIS WORLD, AND HER REMARKS ABOUT DIFFERENT PLAYERS, AND HOW SHE WON, CANNOT FAIL TO BE OF INTEREST TO KEEN PLAYERS IN THE DOMINION, BECAUSE THEY ARE INSTRUCTIVE

'“THERE is a critical time comA ing, during which the older players, who have held the field so long, must give place to the pressure and the progress of the younger ones. Lawn tennis is a game in which the attainment to form of the highest class is slow, even for those who display a genius for it. We must brace ourselves to meet the fresh conditions and different ideas which the rising generation, if it is to be a useful one, must necessarily bring with it. thing that must happen, and is happening, is an .increased stringency in the administration of the rules. Lawn tennis is fortunate in having a code. These rules should be kept to as strictly when playing at home or in the club as at a tournament. It is through carelessness mainly in ordinary play and practice, that the footfault rule is so constantly broken. \TOU will like me to say someA thing about the players I met and beat on my way to the championship. To give what they call a “peep behind the scenes.” First, I had a “walk-over” from Miss Edgington, who had to scratch owing to illness in her family. I was sorry, because she is nice, and her heavily cut returns would have given me practice in hitting low bounding, breaking, and twisting balls with a sort of trajectory which is deceptive. Her excellent anticipation makes her able to get back strokes which would beat many players. So I met Miss Ryan without any previous match. She began with more confidence than I did, and made the best use of her ability to attack. My forehand was not as good as it might have been. I missed

a service return, I do not do this often, even against Miss Ryan, though the result of her service for the receiver is hardly what you would think from the wholehearted labour she puts into its production. It was not until the fifth game that I really got going. Then I won twelve games in succession, but

Miss Ryan fought hard all the while, getting to deuce in three of them. The last of these was the first of the second set. After that, I felt that I could not do wrong. It is often that way in a match. One’s feelings count for a lot. In the third round I played Miss E. A. Goldsack, a pretty, well-built

young Surrey girl. She was too nervous to do herself justice, but in the game she won she surprised me with some fine strokes, beating me at the net once and down the lines. She is quite a new arrival, so to speak. It was her first Wimbledon. We shall see in the future how she will shape. ■JV/JW next opponent was Mrs. LVI Beamish, who seemed quite unable to face the game. She is a baseliner, and I was better at it. She has been playing the same kind of game for so long now that she is not likely to change it. A little while ago, though, she did change from an underhand to an overhand service. The other one was, I think, less easy to judge and to hit, and was certainly more puzzling. Her footwork is good; she does not run with long strides, which are apt to take you too far into the ball and cramp your stroke. In the semi-final there was Miss McKane, who won the championship last year. It is true that I beat her 6—o, —O, but they were the closest two love sets I have ever played. She was attacking all the time, tirelessly, courageously. Many times I had to attack in return. I went more to the net than I have for a long while, because I found that I must in order to keep my control of the game. Her backhand is powerful and she can place it well; sometimes it is difficult to tell where, because she controls the direction till the last miunte. She was hitting her forehand hard and was unlucky with her big ones to the backhand corner, which frequently went an inch or two out when she had a strong position at the net from them. She plays a game rather like a man against me, with which I am stimulated and made keen.

T SHOULD like to mention my countrywoman, Mme. Billout, exchampion of France, who made her way to the semi-final, where she was beaten 6—2, 4—6, 6 by Miss Fry. They tell me that her style resembles mine, and that if only she could remain accurate all through a match she would be second to none. This may well be. When her cross and down court forehand drives are coming off, they are beautiful and she is never hurried; but her backhand is not so powerful and her volleying in a single is not as sure as it is in a double. I should have liked to see the Australian ladies do better, because they make full use of their brains as well as their bodies. Miss E. Boyd, when Miss McKane beat her —l, 6—l on the centre court in the fourth round, was so nervous that she simply was not there for more than a few games. lyriSS JOAN FRY’S much discussed appearance in the Final of the Ladies’ Singles was unexpected. She is an object lesson of what keenness, perseverance and the refusal to accept difficulties as setbacks can accomplish. Her back hand is unorthodox and she can play nowhere but at the back of the court, but by her determination she kept the ball going for longer rallies than most —she has a future before her. TN that there is another lesson. tennis is not standing still, when young people can assert themselves like this. I have noticed that the tendency of the past which was towards a stereotyped method of play and stroke production was not in evidence this year. There was, on the contrary, much more variety. A sports journalist once made the remark, exaggerated, no doubt, but indicative, that he could write an account of any lawn tennis match from the score alone without seeing it. I am sure that anyone who had endeavoured to do this at Wimbledon would have been courting disaster, because all over the ground there was evidence of the attempt players were making to gain variety, to do the something different that surprises and may so score a point. TV/fY own game this year was slightly changed, and general opinion seems to favour the view

that it was for the better. I altered my pace more often and was hitting my volleys harder, particularly overhead. I managed continually to get a good deal of swerve and cut on my second service. It is the swerve in flight, that deceives your opponent as much or more than the break or kick after the bounce. The lessons of Wimbledon are the lessons of lawn tennis, which is the game of nations, and is teaching us all what men and women we really are.