The Art of Lawn Tennis Part 10

What has been the actual tendency in the last decade? In America the hard courts erected have been approximately nine to one gra.s.s. America is rapidly become a hard-court country. France is entirely on a hard-court basis; there are no gra.s.s courts at all.

Play in South Africa is entirely on hard courts. Australia and the British Isles have successfully repelled the hard-court invasion thus far, although during the past two years the number of hard courts put up in England has exceeded gra.s.s.

The en-tout-cas court of peculiar red surface is the most popular composition in England and the Continent.

There seems little doubt but that the hard court is the coming surface in the next decade. Gra.s.s will continue to be used for the most important events, but the great majority of the tennis played, exclusive of the championships, will be on hard courts.

The result on the game will be one of increasing the value of the ground stroke and partially cutting down the net attack, since the surface of a hard court is slippery and tends to make it hard to reach the net to volley. Thus the natural attack will become a drive and not a volley. Hard-court play speeds up the ground strokes, and makes the game more orthodox.

The installation of hard courts universally should spread tennis rapidly, since it will afford more chance to play over a longer period. The growth of public courts in the parks and the munic.i.p.al play grounds in America has been a big factor in the spread of the game's popularity. Formerly a man or boy had to belong to a club in order to have an opportunity to play tennis.

Now all he needs is a racquet and b.a.l.l.s, and he may play on a public court in his own city. This movement will spread, not only in America but throughout the world. England and France have some public courts; but their systems are not quite as well organized as the American.

The branch of tennis which England and France foster, and in which America is woefully lax, is the indoor game. Unfortunately the majority of the courts abroad have wood surfaces, true but lightning fast. The perfect indoor court should retain its true bound, but slow up the skid of the ball. The most successful surface I have ever played upon is battleship linoleum--the heavy covering used on men-of-war. This gives a true, slightly r.e.t.a.r.ded bound, not unlike a very fast gra.s.s court.

Indoor play in America is sadly crippled by reason of no adequate facilities for play. The so-called National Indoor Championship is held at the Seventh Regiment Armoury in New York City on a wood floor, with such frightful lighting that it is impossible to play real tennis. The two covered courts at Longwood Club, Boston, are very fine, well lighted, with plenty of s.p.a.ce. There is a magnificent court at Providence, and another at Buffalo.

Utica boasts of another, while there are several fine courts, privately owned, on Long Island. New York City uses the big armouries for indoor play; but the surface and light in these are not fit for real tennis. The Brooklyn Heights Casino has the only adequate court in the Metropolitan district.

Philadelphia and Chicago, cities of enormous populations and great tennis interest, have no courts or facilities for indoor play. This condition must be rectified in America if we wish to keep our supremacy in the tennis world. The French players are remarkable on wood. Gobert is said to be the superior of any player in the world, when playing under good conditions indoors.

The game of tennis is worthy of having all types of play within reach of its devotees. Why should a player drop his sport in October because the weather is cold? Indoor play during the winter means an improvement from season to season. Lack of it is practically stagnation or retrogression.

The future will see a growth of hard-court play the world over.

Gra.s.s must fight to hold its position. Indoor play will come more and more into vogue.

CHAPTER XI. THE PROBABLE FUTURE OF THE GAME

What will be the outcome of the world-wide boom in tennis? Will the game change materially in the coming years? Time, alone, can answer; but with that rashness that seizes one when the opportunity to prophesy arrives and no one is at hand to cry "Hold, hold," I dare to submit my views on the coming years in international tennis.

I do not look to see a material change in the playing rules. A revival of the footfault fiend, who desires to handicap the server, is international in character and, like the poor, "always with us." The International Federation has practically adopted a footfault rule for 1921 that prohibits the server lifting one foot unless replaced behind the baseline. It is believed this will do away with the terrific services. The only effect I can see from it is to move the server back a few inches, or possibly a foot, while he delivers the same service and follows in with a little more speed of foot. It will not change the game at all.

Sir Oliver Lodge, the eminent scientist, has joined the advocates of but one service per point. This seems so radical and in all so useless, since it entirely kills service as other than a mere formality, and puts it back where it was twenty-five years ago, that I doubt if even the weight of Sir Oliver Lodge's eminent opinion can put it over. To allow one service is to hand the game more fully into the receiver's hands than it now rests in the server's.

The playing rules are adequate in every way, and the perfect accord with which representatives of the various countries meet and play, happily, successfully, and what is more important, annually, is sufficient endors.e.m.e.nt of the fundamental principles. The few slight variations of the different countries are easily learned and work no hardships on visiting players. Why change a known successful quant.i.ty for an unknown? It seldom pays.

The style of play is now approaching a type which I believe will prove to have a long life. To-day we are beginning to combine the various styles in one man. The champion of the future will necessarily need more equipment than the champion of to-day. The present shows us the forehand driving of Johnston, the service of Murray, the volleying of Richards, the chop of Wallace F.

Johnson, the smash of Patterson, the half volley of Williams, and the back hand of Pell. The future will find the greatest players combining much of these games. It can be done if the player will study. I believe that every leading player in the world in 1950 will have a drive and a chop, fore- and backhand from the baseline. He will use at least two styles of service, since one will not suffice against the stroke of that period. He will be a volleyer who can safely advance to the net, yet his attack will be based on a ground game. He must smash well. In short, I believe that the key to future tennis success lies in variety of stroke. The day of the one-stroke player is pa.s.sing. Each year sees the versatile game striding forward by leaps and bounds.

The future champion of the world must be a man of keen intellect, since psychology is a.s.suming the importance that is its due. He must train earnestly, carefully, and consistently. The day of playing successful tennis and staying up till daybreak is over.

The game is too fast and too severe for that. As compet.i.tion increases the price of success goes up; but its worth increases in a greater ratio, for the man who triumphs in the World's Championship in 1950 will survive a field of stars beyond our wildest dreams in 1920.

What of the various countries? America should retain her place at or near the top, for the boys we are now developing should not only make great players themselves, but should carry on the work of training the coming generations.

England has but to interest her youth in the game to hold her place with the leaders. I believe it will be done. I look to see great advances made in tennis among the boys in England in the next few years. I believe the game will change to conform more to the modern net attack. England will never be the advanced tennis-playing country that 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. The 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 and out 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. I am not, provided English boyhood is interested in the game.

j.a.pan is the country of the future. There is no more remarkable race of students on the globe than the j.a.panese. They like tennis, and are coming with increasing numbers to our tournaments. They prove themselves sterling sportsmen and remarkable players. I look to see j.a.pan a power in tennis in the next twenty-five years.

France, with her brilliant temperamental unstable people, will always provide interesting players and charming opponents. I do not look to see France materially change her present position--which is one of extreme honour, of great friendliness, and keen compet.i.tion. Her game will not greatly rise, nor will she lose in any way the prestige that is hers.

It will be many long years before the players of those enemy countries, who plunged the world into the horrible baptism of blood from which we have only just emerged, will ever be met by the players of the Allies. Personally, I trust I may not see their re-entry into the game. Not from the question of the individuals, but from the feeling which will not down. There is no need to deal at this time with the future of Germany and Austria.

Australasia and South Africa, the great colonies of the British Empire, should be on the edge of a great tennis wave. I look to see great players rise in Australasia to refill the gaps left by the pa.s.sing of Wilding and the retirement of Brookes. It takes great players to fill such gaps; but great players are bred from the traditions of the former masters.

The early season of 1921 saw a significant and to my way of looking at it, wise move on the part of New Zealand when the New Zealand tennis a.s.sociation withdrew from the Australasian tennis a.s.sociation and decided to compete for the Davis Cup in future years as a separate nation.

No one can deny the great help Australia has been to New Zealand in tennis development, but the time has come now for New Zealand to stand on her own. Since the regrettable death of Anthony F.

Wilding, in whose memory New Zealand has a tennis a.s.set and standard that will always hold a place in world sport, the New Zealand tennis players have been unable to produce a player of skill enough to make the Davis Cup team of Australasia. It has fallen to Australia with Norman E. Brookes, to whose unfailing support and interest Australasian tennis owes its progress since the war, G. L. Patterson, W. H. Anderson, R. L. Heath, and Pat O'Hara Wood to uphold the traditions of the game.

The Davis Cup challenge round of 1921 was staged in New Zealand in accord with the agreement between Australia and New Zealand and also in memory of A. F. Wilding. The tremendous interest in the play throughout the entire country showed the time was ripe for a drastic step forward if the step was ever to be taken. So after careful consideration the split of Australia and New Zealand has taken place. What will this mean to New Zealand?

First it means that it will be years before another Davis Cup match will be staged on her sh.o.r.es, for it takes time and plenty of it to produce a winning team, but at the time, the fact is borne in on the tennis playing faction in New Zealand that as soon as they desire to challenge, their players will gain the opportunity of International compet.i.tion.

Experience matures players faster than anything else and I am sure that the move that will place a team of New Zealand players in the field in the Davis Cup will be the first and biggest step forward to real world power in tennis. New Zealand produced one Wilding, why should not another appear?

I was tremendously impressed by the interest existing among the New Zealand boys in tennis. I met a great number during my few weeks in Auckland and seldom have seen such a magnificent physical type coupled with mental keenness. These boys, given the opportunity to play under adequate supervision and coaching, should produce tennis players of the highest cla.s.s.

The New Zealand a.s.sociation has made a drastic move. I hope they have the wisdom to see far enough ahead to provide plenty of play for their young players and if possible to obtain adequate coaches in the clubs and schools.

Frankly I see no players of Davis Cup calibre now in New Zealand.

I did see many boys whom I felt if given the chance would become Davis Cup material.

The break with New Zealand will have no effect on Australia, except to relieve a slight friction that has existed. Australia has plenty of material coming to insure a succession of fine teams for the Davis Cup in the future.

Both Australia and New Zealand handle their tennis in the country in a most efficient manner and the game seems to me to be progressing in a natural and healthy manner. The next ten years will decide the fate of New Zealand tennis. If they organise a systematic development of their boys I feel convinced they will gain a place of equality with Australia. If they do not seize their opening now, tennis will not revive until some genius of the game such as Norman E. Brookes arises in their midst from only the Lord knows where.

The future should see America and Australia fighting for supremacy in the tennis world, with England and France close on their heels, to jump in the lead at the first faltering.

It is only a matter of time before the last differences between the International Federation and the America a.s.sociation are patched up. The fundamental desires of each, to spread the growth of tennis, are the same. Sooner or later the bar will fall, and a truly International Federation, worldwide in scope, will follow.

I look to see the Davis Cup matches gain in importance and public interest as each year goes by. The growth of the public interest in the game is seen at every hand. Wimbledon must seek new quarters. The new grounds of the All England Club will provide accommodation for 20,000 to witness the championships. This enormous stadium is the result of public pressure, owing to the crowds that could not be accommodated at the old grounds.

Westside Club, Forest Hills, where the American Championship was held, is planning accommodation for 25,000, provided that they are awarded the championship for a long term of years. Davis Cup matches are now drawing from 10,000 to 15,000 where the accommodation is available. What will the future hold?

I believe that 1950 will find the game of tennis on a plane undreamed of to-day. Tennis is still in its infancy. May I have the pleasure to help in rocking the cradle.

My task is completed. I have delved into the past, a.n.a.lysed the present, and prophesied the future, with a complete disregard of conventions and traditions.

The old order changeth, and I trust that my book may aid slightly in turning the tennis thought in the direction of organized developments. The day of self is past. The day of co-operation is dawning. It is seen in the junior tennis, the munic.i.p.al tennis, and the spirit of international brotherhood in the game.

a.s.sistance is necessary to success in any venture. My book has been made possible only by the aid afforded me by several of my companions on the Davis Cup team trip. The task of arranging the material in coherent order and proper style is one of the most important points. I owe a debt of grat.i.tude to Mrs. Samuel Hardy, wife of our captain, for her never-failing interest and keen judgment in the matter of style.

Mr. Hardy, with his great knowledge of the game of tennis, as player, official, and organizer, freely gave of his store of experience, and to him I owe much that is interesting in the tactics of the game.

R. N. Williams, my team-mate, was always a willing critic and generous listener, and his playing abilities and decided ideas on the game gave much material that found its way into these pages.

I wish to express my grat.i.tude for his able a.s.sistance.

Charles S. Garland, my doubles partner and close friend, gave never-wavering faith and a willing ear to my ravings over strokes, tactics, and theories, while his orthodox views on tennis acted as a stop on my rather Bolshevik ideas.

To all these people I express my thanks for their part in any success I may attain with this book. I have a firm belief in the future of tennis. I recommend it to all. It gives firm friends, a healthy body, a keen mind, and a clean sport. It calls forth the best that is in you, and repays you in its own coin.