Fairweather or Foul

When the weather on the Peninsula turns nasty, our sport lovers go further afield to play.

The Drum
By Dave Keogh

That’s what happened over the recent long weekend when a dozen social tennis players of all standards and various ages – organised by doubledrummer.com’s Anna Cosio – made their way south to raid the coffers of the South Coast District Tennis Association, in Batemans Bay.

Just before 6pm the weary travellers wound their way into the sleepy seaside hamlet. After quickly settling in, the first of many Happy Hours was called and before long, a full-blown party was underway… the perfect preparation for the morning’s matches! Set against the red clay background of Roland Garros on the big screen, the champagne and Sambucca flowed freely into the wee small hours.

This scene was repeated regularly after tennis each night… which brings me to the tennis. The tournament committees in these country towns go to extraordinary lengths to make sure their annual showpiece events run like clockwork. Despite the wild conditions along the NSW coast that weekend, a work crew was on hand every day at 6:30am, soaking up puddles, sweeping debris from the 14 courts, clearing the lines and generally ensuring that everything is as pristine as possible in time for the first ball to be struck at 8am sharp.

The tennis
There’s a real buzz about a centre on the first morning of a tournament. Players come from far and wide to contest the tournie with over $4,000 in prize money on offer. At Batemans Bay there were locals from Ulladulla, Canberra, Goulburn, Yass and Young along with players from Southern Districts, Illawarra and areas of Sydney such as Marrickville, the eastern suburbs and of course, Manly-Warringah! The bulk of the prize money is naturally reserved for the open events and some of the participants here play an exceptional standard. For the rest of the weekend warriors, it’s more about the fun and all standards are catered for, right down to C-Grade.

As competitors rub shoulders around the notice board, pushing forward to see the time of their first match, whether or not they’ve drawn the top seed and for the more optimistic, to trace a line through the draw to a possible Monday final, the tension is palpable.

Over the next three days, only Saturday afternoon was lost to rain. The Tournament Committee shortened Sunday’s matches to enable them to catch up with their original schedule but were back on track come Monday morning. Each of the Manly contingents performed admirably, all making it to at least one semi-final from their three events. Special mention must go to North Balgowlah’s Denise Darby who, playing in her very first tournament, captured both the C-Grade Ladies Doubles and B-Grade Mixed Doubles titles (pocketing just under $100 in cash for her trouble!).

A special mention too to first-timer Richard Honey from the UK (now a Manly resident) who played like a man possessed to reach a semi-final of the B Men’s Doubles with partner, Mike Gordon. Rich was quite simply awesome, one minute firing to the net behind dynamic serves to spear away volleys at will, the next blasting blistering ‘toppy’ backhands past his bemused opponents... and just to prove he could hit winners without using the strings, he also strung together any number of carefully timed deft drop-shots, drop volleys and topspin lobs off the frame, all the time being cheered on by his beautiful wife and 3-year-old daughter along with the Manly cheer squad and a growing crowd of other amazed onlookers on the sideline.

The Team’s last task was to attend presentations of prize money to the winners, then bid fond farewells to the locals for another year, before undertaking a far more pleasant drive back to the beautiful northern beaches.

Anyone keen to join ‘The Team’ can contact anna@doubledrummer.com 

 
The writer of The Drum, Dave Keogh, has been a professional writer for some 30 years, contributing to publications as broad as Modern Fishing and Outdoor, he honed a passion writing a regular column – Talking Tennis – for The Manly Daily. With a varied history including work as a music industry publicist, theatrical agent, band manager, poet, editor and tennis coach, he found his niche in advertising, and with loads of awards under his belt, Dave went into business on his own and now runs several very successful businesses, including an online community connecting sport-loving people – www.doubledrummer.com Most importantly, Dave loves sport, and is an avid supporter of The Manly Sea Eagles…