LAWN TENNIS.

Hokitika Guardian, 2 August 1926, Page 4

LAWN TENNIS.

JUBILEE MEETING AT WIMBLEDON. (By E. Elliott Napier iu the Sydney “ Herald.”) The original game of tennis is, ol course almost as “royal and ancient” as golf itself. Certainly it was played as far back as the thirteenth century in France, and there is every reason to believe that the courtiers'- of Edward 111. of England mixed their tourneys in the lists with those,; less dangerous of the dedans and the tamdour. In an old French chronicle of 1427 we find the best of evidence that the fairer sex were not unresponsive to the charms of tennis, for the author sings the praises of a certain “ Margot ” who was famous for her “ forehand and backhanded strokes ” ! Chaucer men-1 tions the game, and so does frequently; add there is, of course, the famous reference to it in the first act of King Henry V. The terms peculiar to tennis put into the mouth of the English King may be—as is alleged—anachronisms; but their use by Shakespeare is certain proof that the game, with all its modern technicalities, was well known in the days of Good Queen Bess. It was, however, a game for courts and courtiers alone. The erection of the necessary “galleries,” and “ pent-houses,” and “ grilles ” was a costly business—estimated, indeed, at the equivalent of £2OOO sterling, and pre-war values at that—and by no stretching of the term could the game have ever become “popular.” Under these circumstances it is not surprising that attempts to vary a game whose interest was indisputable by eliminating its expensive restrictions should have many times been made. Towards the end of the seventeenth century mention of “ field tennis ” is made in a “Booke of Sportes but it was not till 1874 that the modern game of Lawn Tennis came to cop quer the- world. ,TTTE F Tit ST CHAMPIONSHIP. The first tennis championship was played at Wimbledon on July 19, 1877 ; and it is of interest to reconstruct the scene from the description of a spectator. Such a description appears in a recent number of an English weekly and from it I cull the following notes. “Bound a court rather sketchily marked out. and entirely destitute of any ‘surround.’ or even stop-netting, about 200 spectators are impatiently waiting for the match between Mr Spencer Gore and Mr W. Marshall to begin. The little crowd of enthusiasts are standing round the court or unwisely ■sitting on a few improvised benches on one side of it. They have paid a shilling to come in. At last the umpire climbs into his perch, a chair balanced on a rather rickety table;, and the match begins. . . . The net.is suspended by two .poles secured by guyropes ; it is five feet high at the sides and sags to an indeterminate three feet six inches in the middle. It is innocent of anv tape along the top of it, or of any means of keeping it to its proper height at the centre.” : And what of the play, you naturally ask. What ‘ methods did these old champions use, what skill did they display. Well, let our informant enlighten us on this point, too. “ Both the' contestants.” he says, “ serve underband; but both have anticipated the maxim subsequently enunciated by Ernest Hcnshaw: ‘First tiling to do, got the hall over the. net.’ This they proceed to do in almost interminable rallies of strokes of slow and high trajew, tory, investing the ball witli plenty of cut. . . . Both have very heavy rackets weighing IS cr 17 ounces, and shaped like lop-sided pears. ... It turns out to be a run-awa.v match for Mr Gore. He loses one game in tl.’o first set and two in the second. Mr Marshall plays up better in the third, but just as he seems likely to make a match of it, he unaccountably serves ffmr double faults in succession. This disaster knocks him all to pieces ; and Mr Gore goes out at 6-4, and is hailed as the first champion of Lawn Tennis. Neither man lias volleyed a ball throughout the match ; neither has used the lob ; nothing whatever except steady returns nil and down the middle of the court, until at last the lofty net intercepts a return, or a too vigorous stroke goes out of court.” In 'suchwise was the first champion-ship-played upon the historic courts of “old" Wimbledon. How different the scene to-day, when thousands queue up at every entrance gate; when stands are crowded with an eager, excited I audience, ranging from the King himself to commoners of every class; when the names of the contestants are household words; when representatives of every nation, almost, that claims to call itself civilised, meet together to test their skill; when the famous centre court has become, the battle-ground whereon is annually waged on of the greatest and most thrilling duels in the realms of sport! But most greatly of

all, perhaps, is the difference between those days and these made manifest by , the importance accorded to the All England Tennis Championship by the Press of the world. To-day every big paper lias its representatives at Wimbledon ; columns of description of each day’s play appear not only in British journals, but also in those of almost every country, including our own. But in the “ seventies ” a few bare lines was all that even the most enterprising of papers could spare to chronicle the function. Even so late as 1890 the “ Times ” devoted hut half an inch of space to recording the victory of W. J. Hamilton iu the challenge round. A CURIOUS RECORD. Of the second championship in 1878, let me mention one or two peculiar facts that arc little known. And these are that the man who won it had never | played tennis until the year he entered j for it; that lie is the only man who has j never lost a set at Wimbledon, and j that ho has never seen the place since j that historic victory. That man is Mr! P. F. Hadow. He came from Ceylon,; where he had been engaged in coffeeplanting for some years, in the spring of 1878. He had been a fair cricketer at Harrow, and was interested in all field sports. Naturally the new game had. intrigued him, and when he arrived in England he started to learn it. He succeeded so well that within a; few weeks lie had beaten all bis instructors' and was induced to “ try his luck ” in the championship. The luck was “well in ” ; it even extended to getting him a bye in the semi-final round, after carrying him through five preliminary rounds without the loss of a set. Them lie won—in three more .straight sets—the right to challenge Mr Gore; and then lie got n.alaiia, and was’ in bed' with ice on his head for three days. But neither malaria nor anything else could stop his triumphal progress. He met and decisively vanquished Mr Gore 7-5, 6-1, 9-?, and almost immediately after wc left for Ceylon. When lie again returned be returned also to cricket bis first love. He bus never, even bad the curiosity to look in at Wimbledon again; but one can hardly believe that lie did'not find time to revisit the scene of bis former triumph during this, the year of its jubilee.

In 1881 came tlie Renshaws, and revolutionised the game. One or other of them was either champion or run-ner-up—generally they were both—for nine successive years. In 1897 came the Dohertys—R. F. and H. L.—and in 1903 they won, from the United States and for the British Isles, the Davis Cup. Everybody knows the history of the game since then. Australasia has had a great share in its making; and among the names of those who have won upon the centre court of Wimbledon the highest title that the game can give, none are more honoured and worthy of honour than Norman .Brookes and Gerald Patterson, and that very gallant gentleman and splendid athlete, Anthony Wilding, of New Zealand. It is a matter for great regret that no Australians of prominence competed at Wimbledon on this famous occasion; for their presence would have supplied the one tiling lacking tol.make of the meeting a complete success.