Stigmatized, Marginalized, Celebrated: Developments in Lawn Tennis Coaching, 1870–1939

Abstract

This paper examines the numerous changes to the role, influence, professional standards and general social status of coaches and the vocation of coaching in lawn tennis, focusing predominantly on the inter-war years. It was during this time, generally, when lawn tennis clubs became more open and democratic in their memberships, and when elite-level tennis came to embrace more profoundly the ethos of professionalism. As such, the recognized value and esteem of coaches at both levels increased, which led to advances in the vocation of coaching practices across the sport. These developments are analysed in the light of wider social processes, most notably the widespread and influential class struggles of the twentieth century, which characterized taken-for-granted assumptions about how sport should be played and who should play it. The debate between amateurs and professionals is at the heart of developments in coaching, and forms the central issue in this paper. This article commences with an investigation of lawn tennis from the 1870s until the First World War, and then goes on to consider areas of progress with regard to coaching and areas of continuing inequality. The period after the Second World War is discussed briefly, when attitudes toward professionalism softened further in all areas, despite the considerable delay in not initiating ‘open tennis’ until 1968. Testimony from players throughout these eras reveals the fundamental importance of coaching to achieving success amid the continued hypocrisy of adopting professional standards under the veil of being an amateur, or in some cases ‘shamateur’.

Notes

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37. Lowe, Gordon Lowe, 126.

38. Hierons, How to Learn Lawn Tennis, 97.

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43. Dorothy Round, Modern Lawn Tennis (London, 1934), 15.

44. A.J. Aitken, Lawn Tennis for Public Courts Players (London, 1924), 2; Alfred Beamish and Winifred Beamish, Lawn Tennis for Ladies (London, 1924), 31; Hillyard, Forty Years, 123.

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47. Round, Modern Lawn Tennis, 99.

48. Patterson, Lawn Tennis at School and After, 9.

49. Pollock, Listening to Lacoste, 40.

50. Eustace Miles, Lawn Tennis Lessons for Beginners and Others (Norwich, 1925), 21–2.

51. Fry and Doust, Lawn Tennis, 57–8.

52. Patterson, Lawn Tennis at School and After, 12.

53. Pollock, Listening to Lacoste, 38, 40.

54. Gordon Lowe, ‘Foreword’, in Lawn Tennis: How to Discover and Correct Faults, ed. Major T. Moss (London, 1936), vi.

55. Maskell, From Where I Sit, 50.

56. Major John Charles Shuttleworth Rendall, Lawn Tennis: A Method of Acquiring Proficiency (London, 1926), 10.

57. Roman Krznaric, The First Beautiful Game: Stories of Obsession in Real Tennis (Oxford, 2006), 104; Maskell, From Where I Sit, 34.

58. Krznaric, The First Beautiful Game, 108–10.

59. Maskell, From Where I Sit, 45.

60. Krznaric, The First Beautiful Game, 107.

61. Krznaric, The First Beautiful Game, 106.

62. Maskell, From Where I Sit, 113.

63. Krznaric,The First Beautiful Game, 110.

64. Krznaric,The First Beautiful Game, 108–110.

65. See Krznaric, The First Beautiful Game, 108.

66. See Krznaric, The First Beautiful Game, 108.

67. Maskell, From Where I Sit, 33.

68. Maskell, From Where I Sit, 33.

69. See Krznaric, The First Beautiful Game, 108.

70. See Krznaric, The First Beautiful Game, 105.

71. Fred Perry, Perry Wins! Expert Advice for All on Lawn Tennis (London, 1935), 95.

72. E. C. Potter, Kings of the Court: The Story of Lawn Tennis (London, 1936), 237.

73. Perry, Perry Wins, 98.

74. Perry, Perry Wins, 99.

75. Potter, Kings of the Court, 236.

76. Major John Charles Shuttleworth Rendall, Things that Matter in Lawn Tennis (London, 1930), 196.

77. Major John Charles Shuttleworth Rendall, Things that Matter in Lawn Tennis (London, 1930), 197.

78. Doherty and Doherty, R.F. & H.L. Doherty, 88; Fry and Doust, Lawn Tennis, 45; Hierons, How to Learn Lawn Tennis, 25; Hillyard, Forty Years, 201; Lowe, Gordon Lowe, 127; Myers, Lawn Tennis, 112; Parke, How to Play Lawn Tennis, 10; Patterson, Lawn Tennis at School and After, 4; Perry, Perry Wins, 18; Round, Modern Lawn Tennis, 69; Tilden, The Art of Lawn Tennis, 108; Vaile, Lawn Tennis, 127.

79. Lowe, ‘Foreword’, vi.

80. Pollock, Listening to Lacoste, 18; Wills, Tennis, 197

81. Round, Modern Lawn Tennis, 70

82. Perry, Perry Wins, 85.