Mixed Australian Team Visits – NZ Triumphs

It wasn’t their best team, but we won. It was a bit of a financial disaster, but we won. Some of the matches were rather poorly attended, but we won. So how can this brief visit by an Australian representative team in early August be described as anything but a success – especially after our decisive 3-0 loss (twice) to Australia at the 1968 Seapatt Championships. It was also our first series win over Australia in New Zealand. And it was the first test series combining men’s and women’s teams, adding mixed doubles to the programme.

The men’s half of the New Zealand team, Alan Tomlinson and Bryan Foster (battle-hardened from international careers which began in 1957) were more successful than the women, winning nine of their twelve singles and two of their three doubles. Dogged defender and veteran of the 1963 world championships Joan Brown (pictured - right) managed only one women’s singles win out of six but combined well with Bryan Foster to win all three mixed doubles. 17 year old Yvonne Fogarty won three of her six singles and both women’s doubles with Jeanette Boswell (nee Crosby) (pictured - left). Brown and Boswell lost the other women’s doubles.

New Zealand won the first test 7-4 (racing away from 4-4) and the second 8-3. Australia had a 6-5 consolation win in the final test. The result may have been different had all the Australian players been fit throughout but several cases of influenza dogged the team during the visit.

And they were without their reigning men’s and women’s champions (Cliff McDonald and Suzy Javor). But the tests still produced some spectacular table tennis, especially by the men. The selected Australian players were all from Victoria: Leigh Pascoe (who had been Australian Champion at the age of 15), Graeme Stirling, Lyn Gilbert and Mary Cleaves.

The tour included four provincial contests in which the Australians beat Auckland, Northland and North Taranaki but managed only a 5-5 draw with Otago. There was a contest against a New Zealand invitation team, played at Waikanae (Kapiti) and won by Australia 8-1, and an invitation tournament in Wellington featuring the Australians and top local players, won by Leigh Pascoe.

The tests were played in Hamilton, Gisborne and Christchurch.

Although the tour was sponsored by Rothmans Sports and Cultural Foundation, its overall financial success depended on good attendances and in most cases attendances were not good. Auckland drew an audience of only 150, less than North Taranaki. Northland and (Sub-Association) Kapiti both broke even and Hamilton recorded the largest crowd. All other Association hosts, including NZTTA, lost money - in some cases rather heavily. The tour simply didn’t create the “buzz” of previous overseas visits. The media coverage wasn’t a patch on Michael Wilcox and Murray Thomson’s 1964 tour – or even the more recent and much shorter visit by the team from England in 1967. And the 1969 Australian tourists simply weren’t capable of producing the crowd-stomping exhibition matches so fondly remembered from the Wilcox/Thomson and Neale/Gibbs visits.

But New Zealand won.

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Two of the Best From the Past

A perusal of previous NZ men’s singles champions reveals two names standing out like beacons. Russell Algie won the title six times between 1939 and 1951, and may well have won more had the war years not intervened. Bob Jackson won seven titles between 1950 and 1958 including six in a row.

Thirty years on from the year the first title was won by the earlier of these two towering figures, both of them made a surprise one-off comeback to compete in the veteran and senior events at this year’s NZ Championships.

Now aged 49, Russell Algie won the veteran men’s singles in a field that included solid campaigners such as Keith Pointon and Frank O’Gorman. Bob Jackson (38) dominated a field of 37 players to win the over 35 senior men’s singles. Just the appearance of these two former champions at the Auckland-hosted nationals stirred the crowd. When they won their respective events, the ovation was deafening.

(see photo on left from NZ Champs).

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Teenagers Meet in NZ Open Singles Final

Reminiscent of the battles of the early 1960s between teenagers Neti Davis and Norma Attwood, the 1969 New Zealand women’s singles final was contested between 18 year old Yvonne Fogarty (who already had a two year international career behind her and more to come), and future international Kathy Fraser (age 15) who won the Under 16 girls singles before cracking her way to the open women’s final. The match, won by top seed Fogarty, was an impressive spectacle with Fraser bringing herself to the attention of the crowd, and the selectors, in dramatic fashion. Nobody had looked like beating her on the way to the final.

The fathers of both girls had previously made their mark on the sport: Bill Fogarty was a former NZ Champion and Keith Fraser a still active administrator and former NZ President.

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Viktor Barna Returns

In the same year that New Zealand legends Russell Algie and Bob Jackson returned to the spotlight (refer above), one of the world’s greats was also welcomed back. Former World Champion Viktor Barna had delighted crowds with his fluid, flawless play when he toured this country, first in 1938 with Lazlo Bellak and again in 1949 with Richard Bergmann. His visit this year was brief, low-key and business-related. His playing days now over, he was on a world tour promoting a new plastic ball developed by the Dunlop company – a table tennis brand name inextricably linked with his own. Ten years of research lay behind the ball – a courageous departure from the traditional celluloid ball and designed to be longer-lasting.

In due course the ball went out of favour. It felt heavier and harder and did not have the floating quality of its predecessor. But to those fortunate enough to shake the hand of this remarkable man during his few days in Wellington, assessing the ball was anything but a priority. Far more important was seeking an autograph and having a photograph taken with him.

Within three years of this visit, Viktor Barna tragically suffered a fatal heart attack in Peru while on another world business trip. He was only 60 years old.

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Memorable NZ Championships for Tomlinson

Still at the peak of his career a full decade after breaking Bob Jackson’s six year grip on the NZ Men’s Championship title, Alan Tomlinson had his best New Zealand Championships ever. In a virtual carbon copy of Neti Traill’s 1968 clean sweep (but in the harder-hitting and more physically grueling men’s events), he won both singles in the North Island / South Island contest, all singles in the A grade inter-association teams competition, and the singles and doubles championship titles in the individual events. With Dawn Wade, he also won the mixed doubles – the one national title that had eluded him up till then.

It was Alan’s third NZ men’s singles title and he was destined to win another in 1972 – thirteen years after the first.

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Record Entries at Nationals

The number of teams entered in the women’s section of the Inter-Association teams competition at the New Zealand Championships was a record 22. With the men’s entry also high, the total of 46 teams equaled the record set in 1967. Both competitions were conducted in three grades with C grade played in two divisions.

The women’s A grade champion team was Hamilton while Auckland won the men’s title.

A new record was also set for the number of individual entries in the men’s singles : 167.

The championships were hosted by Auckland, with use of the Mt Roskill clubrooms needed to provide an extra four tables for the teams events over and above the eighteen available in the main venue, the YMCA stadium.

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Three From One Family in the Top Ten

Three brothers (Bryan, Ron and Ray Foster) all featured on the men’s top ten ranking list this year. It was a family achievement never to be repeated in New Zealand Table Tennis’s 75 year history.

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Married Couple Attain Life Membership

Another unique occurrence in our first 75 years was the election to Life Membership of a married couple. Les and Jean Elliott, stalwarts of the North Taranaki Association, were this year accorded the honour of NZTTA Life Membership in recognition of their many years service to the sport.

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