TENNIS: Paul Martin
LAST Sunday, exactly 38 years after the Wimbledon Centre Court had first acclaimed the 21-year-old Golden Boy as their champion, the great Lew Hoad suffered a heart attack in Spain. He died hours later.
In that year, 1956, he had so nearly clinched the Grand Slam _ wins successively at the Australian, the French, Wimbledon and the US open _ but having defeated his closest rival and closest friend Ken Rosewall in the Australian and at Wimbledon, Hoad had the tables turned on him by the slight but magnificently subtle Australian.
The next year Hoad went on to retain his Wimbledon crown, the first man to do so after World War II, and in such convicing style (6-2, 6-1,6-2, over fellow-Australian Ashley Cooper in 57 minutes) that a newspaper headline proclaimed: “Murder on Centre Court”. Only his shock decision straight afterwards to turn professional denied him many more major titles.
In 1957, the game really was amateur, and he had a wife, a small daughter, another child on the way and only $600 in the bank. For the next 11 years he was a key part of Jack Kramer’s professional touring circuit, rivalling Frank Sedgman and later somewhat overshadowed by fellow-Australian Rod Laver. I remember sneaking under the fence at Rondebosch as a tennis-mad child to watch them in awe on their regular visits to the Cape.
Hoad still retained the dashing good looks and muscular build that had made him the tennis world’s heart-throb, and enabled him to perfect the serve-and-volley game.
It was done, though, with a grace and artistry seldom if ever repeated, certainly not by the current generation with their bludgeoning power rackets. His rolled top-spun backhands, an innovation then, proved his most potent weapon.
The ending of shamateurism allowed Hoad to return to Wimbledon in 1968, but his dreams of renewed glory were shattered by Bob Hewitt in the third round. By this time the back pain that had dogged him even in his heyday was becoming unbearable, though he remained stoic about his discomfort.
He enjoyed recalling how in his best year, 1956, he had taken a taxi from Wimbledon to a top London orthopaedic specialist, who examined the world’s fittest and fastest tennis player and proclaimed: “Young man, you must get more exercise!”
Lewis Alan Hoad, son of a tram driver, grew up near Sydney and joined an exceptionally talented group of young players coached by Harry Hopman. As Australian as kangaroos, meat pies and Holden cars, Hoad’s greatest achievements may well have been his devastating performances during his country’s three Davis Cup victories over the mighty Americans, as well as his numerous Grand Slam and Davis Cup doubles triumphs alongside Rosewall.
His Davis Cup colleague and ex-Wimbledon champion Neale Fraser said this week: “He was the greatest player I ever met. He had everything.”
Wimbledon always had sentimental value for the Hoad family: Lew married Jenny Staley, then the Australia number two, at St Mary’s Church, Wimbledon, eight days before the Championships in 1955. He then went off to play in the Queen’s Club final, with a one-day honeymoon to follow, before the newly-weds were recalled to their respective team headquarters.
The couple enjoyed an apparently blissful existence in Spain, where their Campo de Tenis up in the hills overlooking the south coast pioneered the Spanish tennis expansion, seen so dramatically in the results this year.
Hoad had a hand in developing Manuel Orantes, and held an annual tournament at the Campo with its final on the idyllic “Centre Court” as the sun set on the Mediterranean. I played there once, and enjoyed the friendly, unpretentious company of the master. His handshake remained painful testimony to the axeman’s power he had possessed in his wristy groundstrokes.
It was fitting that Rosewall flew last weekend from London to Spain to be at his dying friend’s bedside. Rosewall and other Australians were already trying to arrange a charity tennis event to raise money for Hoad’s medical treatment. He had been diagnosed with leukemia, and was already fading fast. The event may still go ahead, as a memorial and tribute to one of the greatest figures the game has been proud to know.