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How Australian tennis dropped the ball
The Crowd
Roar Guru
23rd September, 2011
5
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The Crowd
Roar Guru
23rd September, 2011
5

Last weekend’s Davis Cup tie was a spectacle that the Australian tennis public has been crying out for in recent times. Why then was the tie against Switzerland hosted by the Royal Sydney Golf Club?

Forget the farcical fashion in which the final rubber between Lleyton Hewitt and Stanislas Wawrinka was handled with relation to bad light.

Presumably, the venue was chosen after considering the impact NRL and AFL finals could have had on crowds. But when you consider that all football finals took place on Friday and Saturday nights, a Davis Cup clash at Kooyong or Sydney Olympic Park could have created the desired atmosphere.

One needs to look back at the time when Hewitt, Pat Rafter, Mark Phillippoussis and the Woodies were at the top of the tennis world, and the Davis Cup was one of the biggest events on the Australian sporting calendar.

Between 1999 and 2003, the Aussies contested four of the five Davis Cup finals; winning two including the 2003 title over Spain at Melbourne Park.

Who could forget Phillippoussis’ topsy-turvy clash against Juan Carlos Ferrero? Leading two sets to love, the ‘Poo’ capitulated losing the third and fourth sets 6-1 6-2 before recovering to take the fifth, and the title, 6-0.

The nation was glued to their screens cheering every point, as they were on that Sunday, for the first time in nearly half a decade.

Which brings me back to the original point; Davis Cup is an opportunity for the nation to unite behind a team, rather than rooting for individuals as we do throughout the year.

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The last two World Group playoffs Australia has hosted have been played in Cairns and subsequently, last weekend at the Royal Sydney Golf Club. Tennis Australia need to strongly consider why they have taken this route, as we can only wonder how Sunday’s match would have transpired had Lleyton been urged on by thousands of screaming Aussies.

The beauty of having a home-ground advantage is it gives you the opportunity to utilize your players’ strengths, and we all know Hewitt thrives off having a sizable crowd on his side.

Tennis Australia have really dropped the ball on this one, not least due to the fact that last weekend we had arguably the greatest player of all time, playing in our country and the marketing of this fact was negligible.

Granted there were lingering doubts whether he would take his place so soon after the US Open, but even in Stanislas Wawrinka, you have a star of the men’s game.

Looking forward to the forthcoming years and it is obvious that Bernard Tomic is going to be the star of the show. Rightly or wrongly, the jury is still out on Tomic among the Aussie public and what better way to win them over than leading Australia back to the World Group in front of a raucous home crowd.

I can only hope that moving forward, venue considerations are given as much time as choosing the make-up of the side itself.

Something has been missing from the Australian sporting landscape in recent years and for a fleeting moment on the weekend, Davis Cup captured our imaginations once again, and I for one want it back for good.

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