Arriving in NSW

After only a few months of the “invention” of Tennis by Major Wingfield, Australian colonies began to receive news information about another craze from England.  This was an era of sporting creation where many games were tried some succeeding and some not.  Lawn tennis was a major success.

In NSW, the growth in tennis began due to the organisational skills of the Sydney Lawn Tennis Club who took the reigns in forging the Interstate Colonial matches which officially began in 1885 and the NSW Championships. These matches were played on the No. 1 cricket ground in Sydney until the NSW Tennis Association was formed and the matches moved to the Double Bay purpose built courts in 1911, pre the eventual move to White City.

From a 1941 article by Dr. McElhone on the development of tennis in NSW, he writes that a farmer by the name of  Mr Bundock from Wyangarie on the Upper Richmond imported a tennis set from the UK in 1876 and could be considered the father of tennis in the Northern Rivers and possibly all of NSW. The racquets were pear shaped and the white tape lines were stapled to the ground. They certainly sound like the original “Sphairistike” type implements.

Sydney Morning Herald 26th April, 1941