Wimbledon Blues
By J. P. W. MALLALIEU, M.P.
FTER the First World War I would 'have given all my A pocket-money to watch G. L. Patterson, Suzanne Len- glen and Bill Tilden. Patterson had that terrific service. Didn't he, in one final, stake everything on his service, slam- ming even the second as though it were the first ? And didn't he score a record number of double faults and lose ? Suzanne Lenglen had that bandeau, that perfected technique and that imperfect temperament. Wasn't she always keeping Queen Mary waiting, and playing everyone off the court except the referee and linesmen, especially the linesman at the service end ? And..Big Bill Tilden, had he not a cannon-ball service as fast as Patterson's but more accurate; had he not a tech- nique which Lenglen, even in her calmer intervals, could not have faulted, and had he not a temperament which was wholly controlled in the interests of Tilden ?
These were the stars on which I was bred. Neither Holmes and Sutcliffe, nor Davies and Kershaw, nor Bombardier Billy Wells nor Willie Smith glittered more brightly for me. Then, in 1930, I went to Wimbledon for the first time and, for the first time. saw W. T. Tilden. I was bored. Obviously, some- thing was wrong with nze. Twenty-two years later, last Mon- day, I went to Wimbledon again. 1 went a third time on Tuesday. Oh dear !
The tube at Westminster was so packed that I was able to insert mysel,f into a carriage only by the use of football- spectator technique. At Southfields the queue for buses was so long that I thought it would be quicker to walk. I was wrong, but at least the walk tuned my muscles. My muscles were grateful for the tuning. I stood, on Monday, from 2.2 p.m. until 6 p.m., when I had to run for a division. On Tuesday I stood from 2.15 p.m. until about 5.30 p.m., which was as long as I could stand it. Because men in front of me were wearing hats or, coming bareheaded, decided to put newspapers over their heads to keep the welcome sun away, I stood on tiptoe whenever I thought that something might be happening. On tiptoe I could see tense faces, but whether the faces were male or female I was not always sure until I had looked at the programme.
I caught glimpses of Savitt, last year's champion, as he opened the championship on the Centre Court by methodically rolling the Indian, Kamar, into the ed. I saw Larsen, a seeded player, direct the ball-boys efficiently, but direct his own play so inefficiently that he went out in the first round. On Tuesday, in singles, I saw Louise Brough, Doris Hart and " Little Mo "—and about the only glance I got was enough. I saw Sedgman and McGregor, the best doubles-pair in the world, put paid to the Belgian Davis Cup couple in about the time it takes to drink a cup Of Lyons tea. In the first minute or so I was fascinated by their skill, but thereafter I began to wonder what the next match was.
And then I saw it. Years ago, when my world was very young, there had been a tennis-player who caught not merely my easily attracted imagination but the imagination of the whole tennis-world. In statistical achievement he had not been, perhaps, outstanding. He'd been mixed doubles champion once, singles champion twice, doubles champion three times- _ not bad, but not the best. But everyone who had seen him play said afterwards: " That chap plays because he really enjoys it. He wants to win." Didn't he, once, in chase of an irre- trievable shot, leap the ring and land in a woman's lap ? Didn't he sweep off his beret, kiss the woman on both cheeks and leap back into the fray '? But if he loses—well, he's had a grand game, and when's the next one '? We called him the Bounding Basque.
Surfeited with unfailing technical skill, and as relief for my tip-toe strained calf muscles, I had begun to read the evening paper. Then suddenly I saw that in Court No. 2 Jean Borotra —could he now be under 60 ?—was due to play at that very moment. The Bounding Basque had nothing on me. I was at Court No. 2 before the man in front of me had time to pible up his hat, or the man in front of him had time to retrieve his home-made newspaper-helmet. I was at Court No. 2, looking for zest, for fun, for simplicity, as well as for skill. But something went wrong. Jean Borotra was not at Court No. 2, or at any other Court, that day. In his stead, two females drearily dragged through an interminable singles. Perhaps it was all for the best. I have never seen Jean Borotra and can therefore keep my illusions.
Oh dear ! What is wrong ?
Is it just that I'm now too old to stand, too old to endure, in the quest for spectatordom, the liquid heat which runs off me, not from exertion nor from the sun, but solely from the pressure of human bodies packed together ? It can't be that. I'll stand eagerly for two hours before a cup-tie, and for another hour, and a half during the game, even when it is not my beloved. Huddersfield that I've come to see. I'll stand all day for a Test Match or for Lancashire and Yorkshire. I don't have to stand at any other cricket-match. No. It's not the physical discomfort.
And it's not the game. I loved to play tennis on the Temple lawn or to watch it in my own garden when my father and brother played one of those vicious, all-in, needle family matches against visiting relatives. Perhaps it is just prejudice. The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club (i.e. Wimble-, don) is just a shade too correct. Its Lawn Tennis Champion- ships include the Gentlemen's Singles and the Gentlemen's Doubles. Even the Mixed Doubles are perfectly respectable, though I hear there is talk of changing that title to something even less suggestive. Tickets for the Centre Court are 15s. Balls, posts, nets, &c., are supplied by Messrs. Slazengers Ltd.,: London; ball-boys by Dr. Barnardo's. Everything is refined.' There is no taint of commercialism. These ladies and gentle- men who float from one tournament to another, now playing on the Pacific Coast, now playing at Forest Hills, now playing in Paris and now at Wimbledon, float upon air and, presumably, live on it too.
Whatever the cause, my two half-days at Wimbledon were unhappy. I wanted to say, " Come off it ! " to the elderly spinsters who filled the air with slang that went out in my school days—" Top hole," " I say, what a swiz ! " and other phrases which nowadays are seldom heard outside queues for the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. I wanted to say, " Come off it !" to the chaps in monocles who directed the sweating crowd to pack themselves still tighter—" I say, there, move into the middle. There:s plenty of room." And I wanted to say, " Come off it ! " to the Wimbledon authorities in general who affect to think that men and women who are, openly, profes- sional players of tennis have horns and a tail.
Indeed, the only moment of real happiness came when, from the back of the Centre Court, I looked at a neighbouring cricket-field flanked on one side by poplars and on the other side by elms. No one was playing on this rolled and rolling turf, but, in my mind's eye, I could see figures that had soil in them, figures not tense and strained, but mellow, absorbing through their pores the sound of bat and balls That field, so near in space, seemed far-removed from " ladies and gentlemen," from appearances that just have to be kept up, from little portions of food carefully left untouched on the plate after each course, from Surbiton, from Alderley Edge— from Wimbledon.
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