by 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.
