VOLLEYER V. BASELINER

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1063, 29 August 1930, Page 7

VOLLEYER V. BASELINER

BATTLE OF TENNIS STYLES LESSONS OF WIMBLEDON One of the outstanding features of Wimbledon was the prevalence and efficiency of the volley’ (says “American Lawn Tennis”). Doeg depended on it and his service almost entirely; Mangin, Allison and Lott added good driving to excellent volleying; Cochet is the all-court play’er par excellence, and at Wimbledon he was merely* Cochet in an all-around slump. There remain to be singled out for especial notice Tilden and Borotra. Time was when the Frenchman staked all on aggressive volleying. Since 1924, when he flashed so brilliantly at tVimbledon, Borotra has been working on his ground strokes while retaining his grip on the volley. He has achieved the almost impossible by bringing the drive and chop to an equality with the volley. Tilden climaxed his wonderful career by retaining his Wimbledon title with the aid of superlative ground strokes, to the almost entire exclusion of advances to the net. This was done deliberately and of set purpose. The American and "Wimbledon champion became convinced, several years ago, that back-court play was the keystone of his success and that advances to the net should be made only when there was an easy kill in prospect. Lacoste, even more than Cochet, taught Tilden this; he believes that he lost to Lacoste in 1927 at Forest Hills by being tempted to forsake the backcourt and missing critical shots when he advanced to the barrier.

“SINCE BEGINNINGS OF GAME” The battle between volleyer and baseliner has been going on since the beginnings of the game. In the ’SO’s of the last century William Renshaw the volley, and H. L. Lawford said that the perfect driver coukl beat the perfect volleyer. Tilden put the matter in a Sentence in his “Match Play’.’: “The perfect baseliner would beat the perfect volleyer in six love games because, by the definition of either perfect style, the base-liner would pass the volleyer every point.” At the beginning of the present century volleying was the vogue; Ward and Wright were foremost among the volleyers, but Whitman and Larned and Clothier proved that driving could hold its own. Later came McLoughlin and Murray to demonstrate that volleying alone could win the championship, while Williams and Johnston countered by winning it with a balanced game of drive and volley. Finally Tilden came as the apostle of back-court play. He has adhered to it steadfastly, albeit coquetting on extremely rare occasions with the volley. In his last and greatest campaign, just ended at Wimbledon, he was a baseliner incarnate, so to say. Another baseliner for the nonce, Borotra, carried Tilden to five bitterly fought sets in the semi-final, while in the final the master-driver Tilden beat the supreme volleyer Allison in straight sets. \ Lawn tennis is not, never has been, and never will be, static. Take the world’s first ten today, with the season only half over, and the volleyers predominate. Before 1930 passes into history either type of game mar be supreme. The dominant driver offers a fine target for the volleyer to shoot at, just as the base-liner wants nothing better than to have his opponent come charging in to the net.