It is widely accepted that Australian tennis is now at one of its lowest points in history. Australian tennis fans pine for the glory days of the 50s and 60s when we dominated the rankings. But is this type of success really achievable again, or are we really merely occupying our rightful place in world tennis now?As Lleyton Hewitt’s career slowly burns out like a neglected campfire, a look down the ranks reveals very little to get excited about. Mark Phillipoussis seems to have finally paid the price for carrying around an Aussie Rules player’s torso on chicken legs with his latest knee injury. Next we have Wayne Arthurs at 35 about to hang up his racquet having won his first and only ATP title last year. Chris Guccione showed early promise but seems unlikely to bother the elite players. Then we have a few journeymen of the likes of Peter Luczak and Nathan Healy, grinding out a living on the tour but generally consigned to the qualifiers of the big tournaments.
The question always comes up — where is our next Laver, Newcombe, Sedgman, Hoad, Rosewall, Roche …
But the question could also be, who was actually playing tennis in those days? There were the Aussies, the Americans, and a few odds and sods from here and there. Being dominant in those circumstances is a bit like winning the Rugby League World Cup — great when it happens but hardly earth-shattering.
The reality is that tennis is now truly a world game. Kids from all over Europe, South America and even Asia dream of being the best in the world and they pursue that dream with a zeal we don’t often see in our young players. The level of fitness required to be seriously competitive seems to be a bit daunting in this country where our legends of old reputedly spent as much time on the grog as they did practising for Wimbledon. Stroke technique has changed dramatically and our old school coaches are only now being superseded by a new, up-to-date breed.
We can never get back to the level of dominance that we once enjoyed, but we could do better than we are now. For that to happen, our best and most talented athletes need to choose tennis over other sports, and that’s a long way off at the moment. The game simply isn’t getting the recruits it needs. This also affects its infrastructure. For example the local neighbourhood courts our young players are learning on are often synthetic grass. It’s cheap and easy to maintain, but it’s not a real surface. Our kids should be learning on the surfaces the pros compete on, and I haven’t seen any clay courts in my neighbourhood.
Our next Golden Age? Don’t hold your breath.
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