Sideline Sid Sports correspondant & historian www.sunlive.co.nz

Tennis has taken plenty of Sideline Sid's attention in the last couple of weeks with Marina Erakovic getting through to the Wimbledon women's doubles semi-finals.

While born in Croatia she came to New Zealand as a six year old and learnt her (tennis) craft in this country. Marina showed extreme promise from a young age, and has a Junior US Open and Junior Australian Open doubles titles on her tennis CV.

New Zealand has had some great players over the years that have included Chris Lewis, who got to the Wimbledon men's singles final in 1983, only to be beaten John McEnroe.

His feats took New Zealand by storm with sports fans getting up in the early hours to watch on TV One. His semi-final victory over South African Kevin Curren was a five set thriller, which seemed to go on forever before the Kiwi triumphed.

However, the best ever New Zealand tennis player plied his trade before World War One. Anthony Wilding, who was born in Christchurch in 1883, would be called a super star in the modern era.

Wilding, who was killed in action in World War One in 1915, won the men's singles at Wimbledon in 1910, 11, 12 and 1913. In addition, he won the Australian Open in 1906 and 1909 and won a bronze medal at the 1912 Olympics in the indoor men's singles.

While tennis has a relatively low profile in Tauranga, in April 1997 the Otumoetai Tennis Club hosted an International ITF Satellite Tennis Tournament.

I went to have a look and it was pretty basic stuff with none of the glitz and glamour of the tournaments we see on television.

A bunch of men's players with world ranking in the mid hundreds, endeavouring to scratch enough prize money to enable them to travel to the next tournament.

My memories are that the Otumoetai Tennis Club did an absolute superb job of hosting the tournament. Local volunteers were everywhere from taking the tickets to running the kitchen.

While there were a number of linesmen and women, the first few days saw some of the games where the players called their own outs.

If my memory serves me right, I put my name down for a volunteer linesman the following year only for the event to be cancelled.

While there is plenty of young tennis talent in the Western Bay, local officials let one get away a few years ago. Brent Hampton, who was starting to turn heads in the junior tennis ranks, turned his back on the sport when he decided to play cricket.

He possesses extraordinary eye-to-hand coordination and the local cricket watchers couldn't believe their eyes when he put bat to ball in his first year playing for Tauranga Boys' College.

Such was his progress in the game that he was in the wider New Zealand training squad for the ICC Under 19 World Cup held in New Zealand at beginning of 2010.

The Bay of Plenty Cricket pathway received a real boost late last week, with three (Western) Bay players in the NZ Cricket contracted player list.

While Kane Williamson was always going to get a high ranking, it was great to see Daniel Flynn come back from the cold, and Trent Boult finally getting the recognition he deserves.

Seeya at the (Steamers) Game.