An occasional newsletter to keep in touch with NZ and overseas members. July 2014

The French are coming. President Des Shaw [email protected] Hon Treasurer Paul Thomson [email protected] Morning Teas in January. Hon Sec. Pam Sowter [email protected] Obituaries.

Editor Cecilie McIntyre [email protected] News of Members.

Wimbledon Round up and Drop Shots Link to IC Council website www.ictennis.net

The French are coming. Billets

We are excited to have an IC group from France and maybe also the United States, visit our country in January 2015. The French team arrives on Tuesday 13th January and will depart Saturday morning 17th January. The French are un- sure of their exact numbers at this stage. They will be playing in Singapore on the way, then travelling to Australia.

We will be participating in some social/competitive with them and will also be arranging other entertainment and possibly sightseeing trips out of Auckland.

To this end we have intimated to the French team that we would endeavour to provide billets in our homes and would be pleased if you were able to indicate your willingness to take a French guest or two for those four days.

If you could advise Pam Sowter as soon as possible at [email protected] and indicate how many you would be able to host we would be very grateful.

Morning Teas and tickets for the 2 International Tournaments in January

You will all be aware that arrangements were different for the Tournaments and Morning teas in January this year. Tennis Auckland did not hold Past Champions Days as they had in the past. The morning teas will still be held on the Mondays of both tournaments, but they will be paid for in full by the ICNZ. Arrangements will be the same again in 2015 .

Tennis Auckland will supply one free ticket for an IC Member and a free ground pass for their partner for the Monday of the appro- priate tournament (Females ASB Classic, Males Heineken Open) and two free ground passes for the other tournament (Females Heineken Open and Males ASB Classic) to enable you to attend one or both of the morning teas. Of course if the partner wishes to sit in the stand with the member another ticket will have to be purchased.

2015 Dates. ASB Classic (Women). Monday, January 5th till Saturday January 10th.

Heineken Open (Men). Monday, January 12th till Saturday January 17th

Ticket Orders. These must be confirmed by mid September to ensure that our order is processed prior to the bookings opening to the general public, but tickets will not be issued by Tennis Auckland until mid December.

In August our Hon Secretary Pam Sowter will send all NZ Based Members an order form for members who wish to come to either or both morning teas to fill in and return to Tennis Auckland.

We do realise that it is very early to make these decisions but this is the way Tennis Auckland has asked us to operate and we must go along with its recommendation. We hope members from outside Auckland will join in.

1 Obituaries

As mentioned last month, 3 of our members died recently. Athol Tills, Roly Ferkins and Bruce Broun.

Tributes have arrived from many in NZ and around the world for Athol.

IC Council arranged for a lovely bouquet and requested the IC colours of pink and grey. Here is Des's tribute which has appeared on the IC Council website.

ATHOL TILLS Athol passed away on Thursday 3 July after a long illness. Athol was at the inaugural meeting of the IC Club of New Zealand in 1956. He was heavily involved in our club as a committee member, president, and finally represent- ed Australia and New Zealand on the World Council. He led teams to play in several countries and was instrumental in bringing overseas IC teams to play in New Zealand. With Frank Sedgman, Athol established the Trans Tasman Cup between Australia and New Zealand which has grown into the World IC Junior Challenge. Two years ago Athol was made the first and only life member of our club. He was passionate about tennis and the IC movement. Tributes have been coming in from IC clubs from around the world. Athol was a good man, a quiet achiever and a very good friend. He will be sadly missed. Des Shaw President, IC New Zealand.

We know about Athol being a foundation member of ICNZ when it was formed in 1956 and other tennis interests outlined by Des. At his service mention was also made of his business involvements which showed again how much foresight he showed . Athol spent 4 years working in London from 1949 and passing the Institute of Actuaries examinations. While there he met Mary and played at Wim- bledon. Back in NZ after working for Dominion Life in Wellington he established a new Department of Statistics at Auckland Univer- sity, and formed several businesses over the years including Metropolitan Life Assurance Company. He continued to lecture at Auckland University and was a consulting Actuary in Auckland until retiring in 2003 .

Athol was also President of Auckland Tennis in 1977-78 and played an important part in bringing many top world ranked players to NZ prior to those years. Bruce Broun A memorial service and celebration will be held for Bruce on Tuesday 29th July at the Eden Epsom Tennis and Squash Club lounge at 2pm.

Bruce Broun, his daughter Rosemary and Bruce and Jeff Robson. Athol in 2010.

Both Bruce and Athol had long standing connections to Eden-Epsom Tennis and Squash Club.

Athol joined as a school boy in 1939. He represented Eden Epsom in Caro Bowl and Auckland in the Wilding Shield. Club offices he held included secretary, selector and club captain. He was an Honorary Vice-President of Eden Epsom.

Bruce was a respected member of the club for 78 years, 38 years as a life member. During this time he continued to give quiet dedication including being ground superintendent for 24 years, tennis club captain and played Caro Bowl, being four times in the winning Caro Bowl teams. Bruce was both a club selector and delegate to the Auckland Lawn Tennis Associa- tion, where he also supervised the care of the Association's courts at Stanley Street for 18 years. He was made a life member of Eden Epsom in 1976. Bruce was also on the Auckland Tennis Management Committee for many years through the 1960's .

2 Roly Ferkins

It is with great sadness that we farewelled Roly after his death on the 28th of June 2014 after battling for 2 years with melanoma. Over the years he played club, representative, tennis seniors and I.C. tournaments. He was a friendly and keen member of the I.C. and participated in many of its activities both in NZ and overseas. He was not the first in his family to be an I C member. Roly followed in his father’s footsteps, Roly Snr who was a founding member of the ICNZ when it was formed in 1956. His wife Raewyn is a long standing IC member as well.

When he retired after 40 years of teaching, Roly and Raewyn trav- elled overseas on five different occasions with IC. In New Zealand veteran tennis teams, Roly played in the world champs in Austria, Turkey and USA. Roly not only played but gave to tennis, coaching Raewyn and Roly Ferkins (front) with Cecilie juniors in the days before paid club coaches, he was president of no McIntyre and Tom Kiely in January this year. fewer than 4 different clubs and also became a life member of all of these clubs.

Roly’s love of tennis was well noted by everyone he knew and was continued by his children and later his grandchildren. His legacy Tom is celebrating his 90th birthday this week. lives on in the tremendous impact his tennis interests had on those As well as being a past Hon Sec of ICNZ Tom is a around him. former President of Tennis Auckland and a Life Member. News of Members

I C Touring Members and New Zealand team members Marcus Daniell and Artem Sitak have paired up and taken the title at the USD 50,000 ATP Challenger in Granby, Canada. This is the second week running both Kiwis have won titles on the tour.

The second seeds advanced through the ATP Challenger doubles draw with relative ease, not drop- ping a set on route to the final, where they found themselves up against top seeds Jordan Kerr from Australia and Fabrice Martin from France.

The title decider was a much tighter contest, with the Kiwis taking the opening set in a tiebreak, be- fore the top seeds fought their way back into the final, levelling the match at a set a piece. But it was the New Zealanders who stood up in the match tiebreak, taking it 10-5, and with that, the Granby Doubles Title, 7-6 5-7 10-5.

The doubles title comes the week after Artem won the ATP Stuttgart doubles crown, and the week following Marcus' singles win in Ilkley, where he defended his 2013 singles title.

Marcus writes an excellent blog occasionally. Click here to read his latest about the dramas while defending his Ilkley title.

From Mark Hadley, living in England. Hi Cecilie, I hope all is well. It's very busy here with Wimbledon in full swing ! I thought you would like to know that I played for the IC of GB against Italy and Mexico last weekend with GB being undefeated on the day at the Hurlingham club. I won both matches. I am playing for GB again later this Summer against Harvard and Yale universities.

I also lost the final of the 40s British Clay Court singles champs and the final of the 35's doubles in Bournemouth last month so I have been busy ! Attached is a pic- ture of the IC match on Sunday with Mr Peter Bretherton who was the President of the LTA up until last year. Best wishes, Mark Hadley

3 Wimbledon Round Up On the same day lost his 4th round singles to Aussie up and coming star Nick Kyrgios, he flew to Palma on the same flight as Murray Dunn's daughter Genevieve ...who says Rafa was charm- ing, although he must have been feeling shocked.

Incidentally Nick's coach for the last few years has been ICNZ Melbourne based Simon Rea. Simon played in our early Trans Tasman matches in Sydney and Auckland, and while playing here I recall Frank Sedgman saying he showed a lot of talent.

From Pat Cash after Petra Kvitova's stunning display in her Wimbledon final win. “All I can say is WOW! Awesome display of controlled power from Petra. Genie will be back many times." To show that it was Petra's brilliance rather than what sometimes happens with a lopsided score like this ( 6/3 6/0) have a glance at a couple of statistics. Genie only made 4 unforced errors. She hit 8 winners and won 37 points...but only the 3 games. Petra meanwhile made 12 unforced errors, hit 28 winners and won 61 points. A short but memorable final. As you can see from the photo of Petra on the balcony at the back of Centre Court, play had barely finished when the rain started. The roof was closed for the Ladies’ Doubles Final.

Within a week of beating Roger in a thrilling 5 set match Novak married fiancée Jelena Ristic.

Roger was as gracious in defeat as he is in victory, and the older twins were there to see the prize giving.

Wheelchair doubles were played for the men and ladies.

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Improvements in Melbourne.

The $183 million taxpayer-funded revamp of Margaret Court Arena has given it a state-of-the-art retractable roof — the fastest operating in the world. The centre’s third retractable roof makes Melbourne’s the only tournament that has three courts playable in rain, hail or shine. But Open fans who buy ground passes for as little as $29 — the best-value and most popular tickets to the two-week tournament — will no longer be able to enter Margaret Court Arena without paying a premium. The cheapest seats for a single session will now set back adults $60 and children and concession holders $55.

Tennis Australia spokesman Todd Woodbridge confirmed the ticket shake-up, but said Hisense Arena, which seats more than 9000 fans, would be opened to ground pass holders instead. “Margaret Court Arena will be a ticketed court for the first time in the ’s history,’’ he said. “The good news is that everybody will be able to get in early and get those tick- ets.’’

Ground passes will cost $39 for the first five days, and $29 after 5pm. Margaret Court Arena ticket packages will be soldfor up to $211 for adults and $198 for concession pass holders .

Drop Shots Li Na 2 time Grand Slam winner and her coach Carlos Rodriguez are parting ways after nearly 2 years together as he is no longer able to travel on the circuit.

Instead he will spend more time at his tennis academy in Beijing.

Last week we saw the 17-year-old German becoming the first 17-year-old in five years to earn an ATP tour level victory, but this time we had to wait one week only.

Another former junior's world No.1 and junior's US Open champion, 17-year-old Borna Coric has earned the first ATP tour level victory by beating World No.46 Edouard Roger-Vasselin in straight sets 6-4, 6-2.Like Zverev, the world No.230 Coric was also given a wildcard at the Vegeta Croatia Open Umag. He had registered a victory over 2013 Wim- bledon semifinalist Jerzy Janowicz earlier this year, but that was in Davis Cup. Alexander Zverev, aged 17 years and three months, is also competing at this ATP World Tour 250 tournament in Umag. He had beaten , Mikhail Youhzny, Santiago Giraldo and Tobias Kamke before going down against .

Roger Federer will not run for re-election as ATP Player Council President . Federer has run the council, which advises the ATP and names the three player reps to the circuit’s BOD, since ‘08. In that time he oversaw the negotiations that led to significant increases in Grand Slam prize money. Federer recently became the father of twins for a second time, and it is unclear if that has a bearing on his decision to step down or if he has a desire to focus more on his on-court game. Federer was the rare top athlete to take a prominent role in the labour negotiations in his sport.

Martina Navratilova On her Rally For Bally experience... "This match is a bittersweet experience. We love this sport so much, which is why we came together, but life really stinks sometimes. It's not fair. It stinks that this is why we're getting together to play. But the legacy will live on and that's the main thing. There'll be plenty of kids that will benefit from this very premature death of Elena Baltacha. But it's amazing that Elena did this academy while she was still playing, that really is an amazing effort, and we'll keep it going."

If you would like to read any earlier ICNZ e-newsletters you will find them on the NZ page by clicking on the council website. Click on our flag on the right then on Noticeboard. No passwords required, and you can read news of other clubs.

Please send any news to [email protected]

For the committee , Cecilie McIntyre

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