Japan Welcomed Back – After 13 Years

Despite fond memories (for those old enough) of the 1957 tour of New Zealand by the world’s top two male players, both Japanese, and of another tour by two world-class Japanese women in 1960, an element of uncertainty surrounded the first visit to this country by a Japanese team for 13 years. There had been several unsuccessful attempts to bring a team here and by now Japan was no longer the force it used to be at world level. The team contained no world title-holders or famous names, and the tour was scheduled to last only 13 days after being hastily arranged at the World Championships by high level NZ, Australian and Japanese officials. Once confirmed, there was ample media publicity and hopes were high that the tour would be a success. The team of two men and two women plus a manager toured Australia before landing in Christchurch on 31 July.

The tour was an unqualified success. Two tests were played but some of the best remembered moments took place in provincial centres. There was a special invitation contest in Taumarunui. This wasn’t even scheduled originally – Taumarunui is not usually on the list of options when considering venues for international sports fixtures. But a spare night between matches in Wanganui and Hamilton was utilised when the Taumarunui Borough Council agreed to provide a venue free of charge and cover accommodation costs. Two of NZ’s top young male players, Richard Lee and Kerry Palmer, faced Toshiaki Furukawa (aged 26 and ranked No 6 in Japan) and Keitaro Sugimoto (age 24, ranked 18). Two hundred locals flooded into the Centennial Hall and were more than a little impressed with the standard of table tennis. The concluding exhibition match between the two visitors was a spectacular climax: Furukawa’s gymnastics in retrieving Sugimoto’s powerful smashes, his ultra-high lobs and his ability to disguise the spin and make the ball bounce in all directions, even at right angles, left the audience gasping. “Thrilling Table Tennis by Japanese” thundered a headline in the Taumarunui Gazette, with photos and text covering a full page.

Richard Lee & Nelson Tizard

There was also great excitement in Wanganui and Whangarei. Richard Lee, based in Wellington and again participating by invitation, joined Wanganui’s long-time administration stalwart and top player Nelson Tizard (both pictured above) in a doubles against the two Japanese men. The tourists had not dropped a match to this point, even after New Zealand had thrown their four best players at them in the first test. But, after losing the first game 11-21, Lee and Tizard combined superbly to win the second 21-19. Lee was at his super-fast and hard-hitting best and Tizard rock-steady. They were able to maintain the momentum and, when leading 20-19 in the final game, Lee put down a crunching winner which left the Japanese standing and sealed the match. “Historic TT Victory for Tizard and Lee”, trumpeted the Wanganui Herald. The Japanese loss, their first on tour, made headlines throughout the country.

In Whangarei it looked like Neti Traill (unavailable for the tests as both were played on a Sunday) would be the first New Zealand player to win a singles. She won the first game against Kasumi Inaguma (age 21, ranked 16 in Japan) and, with the crowd’s excitement mounting, led 10-6 in the second. Then the wheels came off and she lost 21-16, 16-21, 15-21. That gave James Morris a chance to be the first to win a singles. He also was omitted from the test team despite being the only player to win a match against the Chinese in 1972. He lost 18 and 16 to Sugimoto and against Furukawa lost the first game 17-21. He then hit top form, the Japanese No 6 relaxed a little and James won the second game by the remarkable margin of 21-7. Maintaining the momentum he shot to a 16-9 lead in the third before Furukawa staged a dramatic comeback. But James still hung on to lead 20-17, a couple of forced errors took it to 20-19, then James put a sizzling topspin winner straight into Furukawa’s body and the match was won. After the cheering died down one could almost hear the Northland crowd murmuring “There you go – we knew all along he should have been in the New Zealand team”. It was a landmark performance by Morris - Furukawa was a world class player and had beaten former world champions Stellan Bengtsson and Nobuhiko Hasegawa.

The singles win was the highlight of a great Japan v Northland contest. In a match that drew as many laughs as it did cheers, Garry Frew took a game off Furukawa before losing 16-21, 26-24, 18-21 and in an equally entertaining men’s doubles Barry Thomson and Bill Williams lost 6-21, 17-21 in a match that took in foot-stamping, falling over and crawling out from under the table during rallies among other antics. And all this was before the Japanese exhibition matches even started.

Test Matches Televised
Both test matches were played on a Sunday afternoon and televised live. Yvonne Fogarty was the star of the series. The first test in Wellington was a 10-0 whitewash although Anne Stonestreet took both players to three in her singles and the men did the same in the doubles. Alan Tomlinson also took Sugimoto to 24-26 in one game. Then the New Zealanders hit back with four wins in the second test in Auckland – two of them to Yvonne Fogarty. She beat Inaguma 21-17, 8-21, 21-11, and, amazingly, beat the No 2 ranked woman in Japan, (Yoshiko Takase, age 23) 21-14, 21-15. Team-mate Anne Stonestreet also beat Inaguma (16 & 18), and the men’s team (Alan Tomlinson and Gary Murphy) won the doubles 20-22, 21-14, 22-20. It was Tomlinson’s 46th appearance for New Zealand.

Other highlights of the tour included 16 year old Bain Attwood and Gary Murphy winning the doubles in the Hamilton contest and Jan Morris being the first to take a game off the tourists in the Canterbury match (she lost 21-19, 12-21, 17-21). A young Canterbury doubles pairing of Maurice Burrowes and Wayne Adamson did the same in the doubles, losing 9-21, 23-21, 13-21.

There was also a dramatic performance by a man destined to play a leading administrative role at national level for several decades (Ron Garrett) who led Furukawa 16-10 in the Southland contest before losing 20-22, 14-21. Guest player and seasoned international Bryan Foster worried the same player in the same contest, losing 15-21, 22-24. He also did well against him in the contest against his home province, Otago. All in all, the New Zealand players held their own against players from a country with an esteemed table tennis history.

The tour was profitable for the national association and the hosts of the two tests. The provincial hosts experienced modest returns or small losses. A generous sponsorship by Winstones Ltd covered the cost of all internal transport.

This was the 17th tour of New Zealand by overseas teams – 14 of them containing current or former world champions. It was also the first from Japan to include both men and women and the largest team from that country to tour here. The visit was well organized, well publicized and well attended. Its success was a fitting reward for all involved.

 

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Commonwealth and World Championships

A New Zealand team heading for the World Championships is usually a talking point for months ahead of the event, with selection predictions, pre-event publicity, progress results and post-mortems keeping the issue on the boil right through until well after the team returns home.

In the light of this New Zealand’s build-up to the 1973 Commonwealth Championships in Cardiff, Wales, and the World Championships in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia, was somewhat low-key in comparison with previous trips to these major events. It was also a little messy. For starters, the NZTTA Committee resolved late in 1972 that it could afford to send only one team and chose to make it a women’s team as the 1971 women’s team won a silver medal at the Commonwealths and had the better prospects for a higher finish at both events. But a men’s team remained a possibility provided players of a sufficient standard were available to travel at their own expense. One or two top players came close to agreeing to make the trip but finally opted out. In the event four players came forward under the required conditions and a men’s team competed at both tournaments. It consisted of two Aucklanders in England on a working holiday (Don Couper and Jim Fisher), experienced international Bryan Foster who was in South Africa and former Australian Champion Geoff Jennings who had volunteered to coach the women’s team, at his own expense. Foster was available for the World Championships only, as was Ruth Sunderland who joined the women’s team for that event, also at her own expense.

Trevor Flint was appointed manager.

Yvonne Fogarty the Star
Yvonne Fogarty was the best-performed player. It was a much-deserved success for the 21-year-old who had been playing in the shadow of Neti Traill since 1967 and was expected to replace her as our top woman player only to find Anne Stonestreet forging ahead to win the 1973 NZ Championships and secure the status of No 1 ranked player. But while Yvonne and Anne were the two selected players for the women’s team, it was Yvonne rather than Anne who shone on this trip.

Her major achievement was a bronze medal in the women’s singles at the Commonwealth Championships. It was NZ’s first individual medal at this event and the performance earned Yvonne a Commonwealth ranking of No 4. The team finished 5th. In the World Championships Anne and Yvonne finished 23rd as a team, and reached the last 32 in the women’s doubles. The men were 13th in the Commonwealths and 38th at the Worlds.

Warm-up matches had been played in England against county teams and against national teams at the England International Teams Championships held in Brighton.

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Busy Season for National Director of Coaching

A new tier of national coaching was introduced with two 3 day “live-in” camps conducted during the May school holidays for trainees who missed out on selection for the national junior coaching schools. The camps were held in Dunedin and Petone and were attended by more than 40 trainees in total. They were under the control of the National Director of Coaching (Trevor Flint) as were the two national junior schools. Less than a month later Trevor was working with the senior squad which assembled in Hamilton for a three day intensive training programme. An innovation at this event was the contribution of senior participants Alan Tomlinson and Neti Traill whose international experience (more than a decade in both cases) was put to good use during the observation periods.

These five separate events came hard on the heels of Trevor Flint’s high-pressure trip to the Commonwealth and World Championships as team manager.

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NZ Club Teams Championship Revived

Thanks to another Rothman’s sponsorship NZTTA was able to re-introduce a national club team competition, last played as a one-off in 1946.

Regional play-offs were conducted and the final in Wellington was won by local club, Kilbirnie RSA, who defeated University (Canterbury). The Rothmans Challenge Shield and a $100 cash prize were awarded to the winning team.

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Youth Dominates at NZ Championships

Richard Lee and Anne Stonestreet, who when aged 16 and 17 had won the men’s and women’s singles titles at the 1971 NZ Championships, triumphed again this year. Anne had also won in 1972 to make it three in a row. Last year she clean-swept all three titles and repeated this top-shelf performance this year.

Six juniors reached the last 16 in the men’s singles and three in the women’s singles.

Twenty-five overseas players participated, from Fiji, New Caledonia and Tahiti.

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First Indications of Player Rating System

The first hint of what would eventually become a somewhat controversial national rating system came to light as an AGM remit from the Franklin Association. It called for the abolition of the manually produced end of year ranking lists (worked out laboriously by the Ranking and Seeding Committee) and the introduction of a system where a set number of points are automatically allocated for wins at specified tournaments. The proposal failed to gain the necessary support and another 13 years passed before a system along these lines was finally introduced.

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Young South Island Stars Emerge

After already having made their mark as juniors at national level (they won the NZ Under 18 mixed doubles title in 1972), Jan Morris and Maurice Burrowes leapt into the spotlight at senior level by winning their respective open singles events at the South Island Championships while still playing in the junior ranks. Burrowes was poised for a lengthy and very solid career, Morris for a stellar one. A tenacious left-handed attacking player, she went on to train in Japan for three months in 1974 and her next ten years included trips to five consecutive World Championships, five NZ singles titles plus three North Island and eight South Island singles titles.

At this year’s South Islands, Jan scooped the treble in both the open and Under 18 events. Maurice Burrowes did the same in the Under 18s and won the open mixed with Jan as well as his open singles title.

The tournament, hosted by Marlborough, drew a large entry including many from the North Island.

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Central Waikato Disaffiliates

Central Waikato, one of three Associations created after the split of Waikato into three in 1963, disaffiliated from NZTTA but fortunately most regions of the former Association were taken over by the neighbouring Hamilton Association.

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New Fashion, New Problems

In the early 1970s long hair suddenly became popular among males throughout the country (and beyond). Junior, and not so junior, table tennis players following the trend soon discovered that the new fashion created a serious vision handicap. Those with the luxury of owning a dark coloured sweat-band could keep the flowing hair out of their eyes but others had to seek alternative solutions. Requests to officials at the tournament control table for supplies of sticky tape were not unheard of.

The new fashion even prompted the removal of “points will be deducted for untidy hair” from the Barna Cup criteria.

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