Tennis

I made a bad start to this morning’s interclub. I thought we were playing at Karori, not Kilbirnie. I arrived at Karori in plenty of time, but none of my team-mates turned up. One of the guys we played last week did turn up, however. Damn. I had a look at the drawsheet and had to hightail it to Kilbirnie, which isn’t particularly close to Karori (or Kelburn or Khandallah or any other posh places beginning with K that I might have forgotten about). At the time I thought, this is normal anxiety, normal stress brought about by a normal everyday event. It almost makes a nice change.

I didn’t play well in the doubles, to put it mildly. In the first few games I hardly hit the ball. That might be why we led 4-1. Our opponents had no problems wiping out our lead, and we were fortunate when they caught the tape on the sudden-death point in game nine (the only game of the match to reach sudden death) to put us back in front. We broke in the next game to win the set, despite my general ineptitude. We trailed 5-2 in the second set but pulled it back to 5-5 after my only decent spell of the whole match. The 11th game, however, was on my partner’s serve. Just what am I supposed to do in that game? Intercept at the net, that’s what, but I’m so terrible at that. They broke, and their better player put together an impressive love service game to put away the set. His serving didn’t get any worse in the super tie-break which we found ourselves in yet again; we won the first couple of points but went down 10-5. I was really disappointed with my performance and felt I let my partner down badly.

Singles. What a contrast. I played the weaker of our doubles opponents, the same bloke I played in Week 5 when I fell over and lost four straight games but won easily in the end (the format of the competition makes it possible to face the same player twice in one season). This time, after one or two scratchy games early on, I won 6-1 6-0. He had no real weapons and I was able to stay in the rallies and generally wear him down. He came to the net probably too much and I hit a number of passing winners.

The sun came out just as I was finishing my match, and I was more than happy to hang around for the next two hours while the other matches played out. Overall we lost by four matches to two. It could have been worse if my doubles partner hadn’t won his singles 7-5 in the third set. It could have been a lot better if I’d shown up to the doubles.

Everything is such a struggle at the moment that I didn’t hold out much hope for today’s outing at the Wellington club, which is one of many clubs in Wellington. Sleep deprivation would surely have an effect on my play. We started with the doubles: we lost the first set 6-4 after gaining an early lead, then won the second 6-3 to set up the dreaded super tie-break. We trailed 8-4 in the ten-pointer but won the next three points, only for their (better) player to send down two fantastic serves, the second of which was rendered almost unreturnable by a gust of wind. It was a dramatic finish to a close match. Before the shoot-out we went to sudden death six times (0 from 3 in the first set, 2 from 3 in the second).

I had a longish break in between matches. I spent some of that in the club rooms which are always fascinating. Photos of winning interclub teams going back more than a century: the hairstyles, the rackets, even the fonts used for the names. Occasionally I’d recognise a famous surname. Sometimes you’d get opening day photos: just look how many people turned out in the thirties or the fifties compared to today.

In the singles I felt really sluggish. From 3-1 up in the first set I lost four straight games amid a barrage of winners from my opponent. I lost 14 consecutive points or something ridiculous. He made his fair share of errors, but he could accelerate through the ball on the forehand, killing off points that I’d had the upper hand in. I saved a set point on my serve to close to 4-5, then faced three more in the next game which was the longest of the match. He double-faulted on one, but I saved the other two with winners including a volley (most unusual for me). Strangely the fact that I’m feeling so much pressure elsewhere in my life might have helped me on those crucial points. When I’m feeling my sanity going down the plughole, who cares if I might lose a set of tennis? Two more breaks of serve took us into the tie-break in which I struck something of a purple patch to take it 7-2. I still wasn’t overly confident because physically I felt shot to pieces, but I got my nose in front and finished strongly in the second set which I won 6-3. Four months ago I might well have won rather more comfortably, but under the circumstances this was a very good win for me. It took 80 minutes or thereabouts. Sheer determination and a stroke of luck got me over the line in the first set; had I lost that set I suspect the match would have run away from me.

This was a direct match-up between the top two teams in the league. We won three matches out of six but claimed the overall win by virtue of winning more sets. Those four set points were pretty important then, not that I cared about that at the time.

I spent easily more time on court today that in any of my pre-Christmas interclub outings. In the first set of the doubles we never got a game in front and at one stage trailed 5-3, but our opponents fell away a bit and we ended up in a tie-break where we took a 6-3 lead. Unexpectedly they then played three very good points, including two on my serve (what could I have done differently?) to make it 6-6, and the final two points ended with me erring into the net. Great. We’ve just blown three set points in a tie-break, and the only way we can win this match now is in a super bloody tie-break. And they’ll be cock-a-hoop (isn’t that a funny expression?). Surprisingly our opponents’ level dropped in the second set and as we took a 5-2 lead my partner gave me one of those annoying fist bumps. I’m guessing a fist bump is supposed to make you play better. Or something. Our lead was soon cut to 5-4, but we brought up three more set points in the following game. They all came and went, including a sudden-death point, and it was 5-5. A major turning point came in the 11th game when we won a high-intensity rally to get to 30-all. This galvanised us, and we won the set 7-5, taking our fifth opportunity of the set and eighth overall. Super bloody tie-break. We lost the first three points but won the remaining ten. It was nice to win but I didn’t feel I was of much help to my partner until that big point towards the end of the second set which got my intensity level up. We played only two sudden-death points – winning one and losing one – but frankly with those tie-breaks the match was sudden-deathy enough that it didn’t need any more.

In the singles I played a bloke in his sixties with a stronger-than-average backhand for this level, making life difficult for me at times. I was comfortable if a little erratic in the first set which I won 6-2 in under 25 minutes, but the second set was over twice as long as the first and a different beast altogether. I got up 3-0 after some long games, and then won a ridiculously long point to reach deuce in the following game. My opponent stood facing the fence for a minute or more, finally saying “that was a real gut-buster”. I felt sorry for the poor bloke. I hardly gave him the next two points but I certainly eased back a bit, something I can’t ever remember doing before and will avoid doing again. He took advantage, winning that game and the next (yet another deuce game). Suddenly I was struggling, especially on my forehand. We reached 4-4. I hit two winners (they’d been in very short supply) early in the ninth game and he missed some would-be winners by small margins to leave me serving for the match. I led 5-4, 40-15: double match point. On the first of these he got lucky with a net-cord; on the second I served a nervy double fault. Bloody hell. Two more long rallies ensued and I got there somehow. I timed the match at 76 minutes but it felt longer. He was a tenacious opponent and after giving him a sniff in that 3-0 game, I never felt in control. It was a good job I’d built up a lead because I sure as hell needed it. Overall the team won by four matches to two.

I fear that both the Australian Open finals will be short, such is the dominance of Serena Williams and Novak Djokovic (and in the case of Serena, presence too). If Serena does somehow get beaten I’ll need to update this page because Angelique Kerber faced a match point as early as the first round.

I played in a handicap tournament at the tennis club last weekend (and nearly didn’t because I was still a bit, um, handicapped after the tumble I took in my interclub match). Tennis has never embraced handicapping in the same way that golf has. I think that’s because tennis between players of vastly different standards isn’t much of a game, and giving one player a head start doesn’t magically change that. In golf you’re playing your own game, which isn’t affected (except maybe psychologically) by whatever ridiculous shots Jordan Spieth pulls off if you happen to be playing alongside him. There’s no golfing equivalent of “getting his high kicking serve back” or “combating his heavy topspin”. However, it’s fun to try handicapping in tennis once in a while, and last weekend’s tournament had a certain novelty factor which I enjoyed.

We didn’t use normal tennis scoring; instead we simply played up to 31 points, swapping serves after every five. I played six matches in all:

Singles:
Round 1: started 10 points behind (‒5 to +5), won by 12
Round 2: started 5 points ahead (0 to ‒5), lost by 2.

Mixed doubles:
Round 1: started 5 points ahead (0 to ‒5), won by 8
Round 2: started 5 points ahead (0 to ‒5), won by 11
Semi-final: started 10 points ahead (0 to ‒10), lost by 5.

Men’s doubles:
Round 1: started even, lost by 13.

There are more “levels” in tennis than people think. A better player can easily overcome a ten-point handicap against a weaker player, even in a first-to-31 match. In my first-round singles match I needed to win 36 points out of 61, or 59% of the points. I comfortably managed that, winning 72%. Naturally I was disappointed to lose my second-round match by just two points. My opponent wiped out my head start on a few occasions, but each time I was able to win the next point, most notably at 24-all when I served an ace. He did get his nose in front for the first time at 28-27, but I won the next point and then hit an angled return winner to lead 29-28. At that stage I thought I would do it, but crucially he hit my backhand sideline in the middle of a long rally on the next point, and he always had the upper hand on the last two points.

The men’s singles draw was spiced up somewhat by the presence of a ten-year-old by the name of Angus. He’s at the club with his dad all the time; he can’t get enough of the game. He scored two wins over fully-grown men, one from scratch, the other giving away five points! I’d have played him in the semi-finals, giving him ten points, had I won my second match. One of Angus’s victims (the one who had the head start) was from the UK; he said he’d tell his mates back home that Angus was six foot four with biceps and pecs that you wouldn’t believe.

My mixed doubles partner, who was all of five foot two, was something of a surprise package. She was very consistent and had some unorthodox shots, as I do sometimes. In our second match we seemingly had a zillion match points up our sleeve and needed about half a zillion as our male opponent found some form right at the end. Some way through our semi-final we still had our ten-point buffer, but starting from 0 to ‒10, instead of 5 to ‒5 as my first singles opponent did against me, made it a longer match. I knew they had a long time to catch us up which they jolly well did. It was a good match all the same. Starting the men’s doubles at scratch was a bit of a joke; they were strong doubles players and we’d both have been amazed if we’d got within cooee.

Britain’s recent Davis Cup triumph was their first in almost 80 years. It was rightly celebrated, but it shouldn’t disguise the fact that Britain has a dearth of top tennis players: just two men and two women inside the world’s top 100. Having lived in France (where they currently have ten men and three women in the world’s top 100), it’s easy to see why. In France, it’s seen as a game for everyone; in the UK it’s seen as a game for toffs. Unless the image of tennis changes radically in Britain, Wimbledon and Davis Cup wins are likely to remain once-in-a-lifetime events.

Week 5 was 3½ weeks after Week 4, and Week 6 won’t be until February. I didn’t make the schedule.

As usual, we played the doubles first. I seemed to have a target painted on me; whenever my partner served to the deuce side, the returner aimed straight at me at the net. I’m surprised I don’t see that tactic more often. I’m not a good net player and before long I retreated to the baseline. The first set was nip-and-tuck but we eked it out 7-5. We probably only won half the points, if that, but all three of the crucial sudden-death points went our way. So did a fourth in the second set which we won 6-2. There wasn’t much between us but we had the better of the longer rallies.

My confidence in the singles was boosted when my opponent sat down to send a text during the change of ends after just one (albeit long) game. I led 2-0, but on the last point of the third game I fell on the concrete and scraped my hand and both knees. I managed to get some plasters so that I could at least continue playing, but on the resumption I fell 4-2 behind. I was physically hampered, my ball toss was terrible, my forehand was starting to elude me, my opponent’s game was too similar to mine, I was getting very few cheap points, and things simply weren’t looking good. He chucked in two double faults to begin game seven, and I was able to capitalise. I saved a break point in the eighth game to tie things up, and I never lost another game all evening. I won ten games on the trot to win 6-4 6-0 without, in truth, playing all that well. As a team we lost 4-2. I’m feeling quite sore now.

So far this season I’ve won nine matches out of ten. I certainly didn’t expect that in Week 1. My most satisfying match was the 6-1 6-1 win I had in the singles in Week 2, coming straight off a heavy loss in the doubles (my only defeat). If I even have a zone, I was in it for those 45 minutes.

Donald Trump. It’s great to have someone sticking two fingers up to the establishment, isn’t it? Uh, no. Mr Trump, of the monstrous Trump Tower I had the privilege of seeing in Chicago in September, is very much of the establishment, and he’s a very dangerous man, currently benefiting from a very messed-up political system.

Work. The two-hour meeting we had this afternoon made it clearer than ever that I can’t keep doing this shit. Seriously.

On Thursday I played a practice set of singles at the club. I completely lost my ball toss and threw in 15 or so double faults including at least three in the tie-break which I somehow won 10-8. After that, I expected to have a tough time of it in this morning’s interclub.

One of our doubles opponents – the one I’d be playing in the singles – was from the north of England and had quite a footbally demeanour on court. “Come on boys, let’s get it together.” The four of us had a combined age of at least 170 but we were all “boys”. We won the first set 6-3 but went through a sticky patch in the middle of the second. We led 40-0 on my partner’s serve at 2-2 but I plonked an overhead into the net on the next point and we lost the game on sudden death. We lost the next game too and at that stage there was a distinct whiff of a super tie-break (and it really does pong as I’ve mentioned before), but from 2-4 we rattled off the last four games for the match. I still had ball-toss issues affecting my serve but I managed to keep them in check. We split the four sudden death points evenly.

Then came the singles against the second left-hander I’ve played this year already. In Auckland I’d go whole seasons without ever facing one. My opponent arrived in New Zealand in 2003, just like I did. He picked up the game as an adult; that suggests that he’s a better all-round sportsman than me. That I can play tennis is due in large part to hitting a ball against a wall, semi-obsessively, between the ages of six and nine. I played a lot with my parents in the back yard then too. By the time I stepped onto a tennis court I’d already spent three years developing appalling technique, which the lack of space in our back garden necessitated. But I could keep a rally going for ages. We had quite a few long rallies in our match this morning. I was just on the right end of most of them, and I beat him in a tick over 40 minutes without losing a game. I’ve now lost just nine games in four singles matches.

My partner won his singles 7-6 (9-7), 6-0, saving five set points in the tie-break. That match brought to mind a painful defeat I suffered a few years ago. We won overall by four matches to two.

These “weeks” of interclub tennis aren’t necessarily every week. This “week” I played with the same bloke as last time in the doubles. We’d had some practice in between. Our opponents weren’t as good as last time and we won 6-2 6-3. We won all four sudden death points – that made a huge difference. Both the games we lost in the first set were on my serve – I was having a shocker in that department. In the second we lost three straight games to go 3-2 down but in the latter stages they went off the boil a bit and we made very few errors. For a minute there things seemed to just flow. Hey, I’m enjoying this. The last game was a bit tense – we needed four match points (including sudden death) and I really didn’t fancy the idea of serving it out at 5-4 having had all those match points.

My singles opponent won the toss and put me into bat. After my travails on serve in the doubles, this wasn’t a silly decision. He promptly broke me to 15 (aided by two double faults) and went 40-love up in the next game. I wound up winning the set 6-1. He had a point for 2-0 early in the second. I won that set 6-1 as well, and I had the match wrapped up in 52 minutes – reasonably long considering the score, which was a repeat of my previous singles result. We had plenty of long rallies – we were both strong on defence – and he got a lot of joy by hitting cross-court forehands to my backhand. Despite that, I still won easily. Was it the weather? Had he had a late night? An argument with his wife? Was it just a match-up of styles that suited me? Then it dawned on me. Maybe, just maybe, I keep winning 6-1 6-1 because I’m not too bad at this tennis lark. Me being good at something is a possibility. Being good at something that matters, that I could make a living out of, well that would be bloody amazing, but baby steps…

A weird stat: 11 of my last 13 sets of singles interclub have been 6-1 sets, going right back to my last defeat which was in Auckland. I lost that match 6-1 1-6 6-1.

I had a very enjoyable evening at the pub tonight with five other blokes, one of whom is interested in living with me.

The ABs are guaranteed to win the final which kicks off in a few hours, even if it’s the Aussie Bastards.

I played interclub again last Saturday. We had a bit of a shocker in the doubles. My partner was a nice bloke but we’d never played together before. Our opponents clearly had, and they were simply better doubles players than the pairing we faced the previous time. There were very few of the ten-plus-shot rallies that I do reasonably well in; I guess it was, unfortunately, proper doubles. We were competitive in the latter stages of the first set which we lost 6-3, but got wiped out 6-0 in the second. We went oh-for-three (pardon my American) on sudden-death points. In one game on my serve in the second set, we lost the first three points, then won the next four, only to lose the last two. I double-faulted three times in that game in the swirling wind, including on the sudden-death final point.

My singles opponent (who we faced in the doubles match) was left-handed like me. This is usually bad news. He had a look of confidence about him as he stepped onto the court. I’m not sure I even got his serve back in the first game and I didn’t hold out much hope for the rest of the match. Remarkably I only lost one more game all match, in the middle of the second set when he hit four winning drop shots. I never imagined I’d win 6-1 6-1, and neither did he nor the handful of people watching. He came to the net too often; I was able to pass him and occasionally lob him. I respected his game though and kept my foot on the gas until the end.

My doubles partner lost his singles in three sets after winning the first set on a tie-break. He took a very long break after the first set for no apparent reason. I told him after the match that he should have got on with it; when you win the first set on a tie-break you have a ton of momentum and you need to make the most of it.

As a team we drew 3-3 but won 7-6 in sets. There was another interclub battle going on at the same time as ours, involving a 77-year-old bloke who was on the away team. Sometimes you’ll see that in the doubles-only grades, but in singles, wow.