*
Miss Alice Marble, the United States Women's Singles tennis champion, will be making her first Wimbledon appearance this season.
WOODERSON RECOVERS FROM INJURY
X-Ray Reveals Limb In
Perfect Order
CONCENTRATING
ON HALF MILE -
(By "THE TWELFTH MAN”)
London, February 8. Every athlete will be pleased to hear that Sidney Wooderson, the mile champion, who broken down in the Olympic Games, is now per- has started to fectly sound and run again, gently with his club, the Blackheath Harriers, across the country. He has felt on ill effects.
A recent X-ray has revealed that the injured leg and foot is now in perfect order, and aided by walk- ing, skipping and swimming, Wood- erson has put on nearly a stone.
It is not the intention of Wooder- son's advisers to suggest any com- petitive work during the next few months, and it will be May before he runs in public on the track.
In ordinary circumstances Wood- erson might have gone for the Sou- thern Cross Country title this year, but that is all forgotten now.
PLANS FOR THE SUMMER So satisfied are the friends of Wooderson that the British cham pion is completely himself again that plans are already afoot for him to do something big in the mat- But be ter of time over a mile. will not confine himself to the mile, and will appear in several half-
mile races...
He has already done 1 minute 54 4-5 seconds for the half, which is very good going; an last year, at Chelmsford, he set up a new Brit ish record of 4 minutes 10 4-5 sec- onds for the mile. Maybe he will manage to beat that record during the coming season.
AT THE DINNER One thing is certain, and that is that Wooderson will get a big re- ception at the annual dinner of the Blackheath Harriers at the Waldorf Hotel on Tuesday.
THE CHINA MAIL, MARCH 6, 1937.
EXEMPTION OF DAVIS CUP HOLDERS FROM EARLY ROUNDS
THE
IS IT WISE OR FAIR TO ALL?
some
THE Davis Cup competition of the future may differ in
important details from the Davis Cup of the present and the past. Some of the suggested changes put forward by Mr. Clifford Webb, in the London Daily Herald have the merit of cos- mopolitanism rather than parochialism. These may also be pro- phetic as given below:-
"BEHIND this. Davis Cup. The receipts would
re-
competition there is, and always has been, a muttering and a fluttering of slight sentment against certain fea- tures of the annual international lawn tennis tournament.
L
But the feeling is growing that this exemption of the holders from all rounds, except the chal- lenge round, is neither good for the competition game generally.
nor for the
There was a time when the holders of the Wimbledon sin-
gles championships were not called on to play through the competition. That soon came to an end, when it was realised that the rule kept the most at- tractive player out of the com- petition until the last day. And that is precisely what some of the tennis nations have been thinking about the Davis Cup.
A PROPOSAL
N some of the European coun-
tries where it is extremely difficult to get sufficient spec- expenses-even tators to pay for early round matches it is felt that to be drawn against the holders in the first round would, at least, provide home tennis enthusiasts with one at tractive tie.
ee, four, or
The frequency with which Davis Cup nations win the
five years succession is quoted to prove the difficulties of challengers. Long sequences of wins for any one nation are apt to rob the competition of much of its. in- ternational interest
But that isn't all. I hear that the most startling proposal yet made in connection with the Davis Cup is to be placed before the responsible committee in the near future.
BEST TWELVE
TT is this. Entries should be limited to, say, 12, and the whole competition decided dur- ing a fortnight's tournament at one specified centre.
A rota would be drawn up, and the competition given to each of the big cities in turn-Lom- don, New York, Paris, Berlin, Sydney, for example.”
With three or four courts available, it is considered that the whole competition could easily be got through in a fort- night, beginning and ending on a Saturday, or a Sunday as the case may be
His great rival, Jack Lovelock, the Olympic champion, is also ex- the pected to be present, and as guests will also include some past stars of the track, such as George, the occasion should memorable in the annals of the club and athletics:
G
be
It is argued that such entrated rnivals the
-con-
men's tennis in the world not fail to attract big crowds.
be pooled
and equally shared after expen- ses have been paid.
L
BAD SYSTEM
ONG and weary wanderings from one country to an- other would be avoided, as would long lapses between rounds and the strain imposed on players by participation in various na- tional championships, followed, immediately by long trips to play off a Davis Cup tie in some other country.
We had an instance of that last year, when the Germans had to race from Wimbledon to mid- dle Europe for a Davis Cup tie, and then back to Wimbledon for the inter-zone final with the Australians.
That was a bad arrangement, and there are bound to be many such bad arrangements the present system.
DIPLOMACY
under
THE question of selecting the 12 entries in the event of
Popular Miss Helen Hall Jacobs, the defending Wimbledon Cham- pion, and runner-up to Miss Alice Marble in the United States Women's event, has spent the winter in England riding to hounds to keep fit.
the list being
over-subscribed
would be a problem, calling for a certain amount of diplomacy; but I feel sure that several of now. enter the nations which teams for the Davis Cup would be better off financially if they did not compete.
Anyway, it is a novel sugges-. tion and, even if an early round had to be played elsewhere in order to limit the number of teams to eight for the big show, there would still be created an enormous amount of interest.
The indications are that either something of this sort will have to be planned, or else the com- petition altered to a bi-annual affair-a move that has already been put forward officially more than one occasion."
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