It has been a turbulent year for tennis, but the future is looking brighter
TENNIS: Jon Swift
IN attempting a retrospective of a turbulent year for tennis in this country, it is more apposite to look ahead than behind. This is not to discount the notable successes achieved by Wayne Ferreira — twice winner over Pete Samparas — and Amanda Coetzer as individuals and the Davis Cup team
With something akin to chaos reigning on the home front our players kept the brash colours of our new flag fluttering across the venues of the globe.
And yet in scanning a horizon that looks initially a lot less unforgiving than it did 12 months ago, some of the sins and omissions which have been visited on the sport have to be highlighted
Mervyn King undertook an arduous one-man examination of tennis and, while all the findings will probably never be quoted chapter and verse, the sport and the nation owe the King Commission a debt beyond price for the work done by a man who has conquered the intricacies of both business and law, for the deciseveness and — perhaps above all fairness and speed with which he completed this work.
Tennis in this country had been stripped — one way or another — of virtually every asset. But most dangerously for the wellbeing of the game, tennis had lost the confidence of all involved: the administrators, the players and the sponsors.
King changed that perception by forging a new base and on that base Terry Rosenberg was charged with rebuilding the crumbling edifice.
It would be presumptuous to speculate on whether Rosenberg has aimed the odd kick at the family dog in the first weeks. He probably had more than ample cause. Yet outwardly he has approached the rebuilding process in the true spirit of masakane.
Rosenberg has instilled a new vibrancy and enthusiasm for the game, instilled his sense of humour which always bubbles just below the surface and brought a refreshing transparency and honesty into tennis. Witness to this was his reponse to a query about future plans. “I don’t know,” he said with a trademark grin. “I have still to get down and work on it.” No equivocation or hedging, just a straight answer. This, you feel, is a man you can deal
Certainly the sponsors who had left the game in droves had the same feeling about the new chief executive. First came MTN putting up R10-million. Then came the sporting goods giant Wilson with R5,4-million.
And, in the true spirit of nation building, much of the money will go towards grassroots development, starting to set a parallel base to the new foundations laid for the administration which has sensibly encompassed some proven expertise. Alongside Rosenberg there are men of experience and quality like Gordon Forbes and Keith Brebnor, seconded from his job with the Greater Johannesburg Transitional Metropolitan authority to oversee the Davis Cup tie against Austria in February.
Between them they convinced the International Tennis Federation’s Davis Cup director Thomas Hallberg that the grass at Johannesburg’s Wanderers will indeed provide a surface without the cloying qualities which made the tie against Australia in Durban such a shameful catastrophe.
It has been a dynamic start to a new era, but to say that this is more than anything than just a start would be to gild a lily long left to wither.
But there are signs that things are moving. Kevin Curran, the former Wimbledon finalist and Top Tenner now installed as a Davis Cup selector, made the point eloquently with his call for a return to the super squad system, enabling young players to experience the global nature of the game.
The development of the sport at the top is as important as it is at the entry ring. A super squad would enable young players like Jeff Coetzee, a teenager from the disadvantaged far reaches of the northern Cape who started his careeer with a racquet cut from scrap wood, to really advance.
Coetzee is just one of many and is chosen merely to show that the humble nature of a background and the initial lack of equipment or facilities can be overcome. It is with players like this young man that our future rests. This aspect, more than any other, is the job which faces Rosenberg and company.
It is an unenviable job, but at least, in the present South African context, it is being approached with humour, enthusiasm and most importantly with a growing amount of earned