Members Login
Username 
 
Password 
    Remember Me  
Post Info TOPIC: King's Cup Tennis - can anyone help?


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:
King's Cup Tennis - can anyone help?


I wondered if anyone could help. I love reading on the history of tennis. When I was younger (I was born in 1965), around that time and through to the 80's , there was an annual tennis tournament called the King's Cup. Given by King Gustav of Sweden in the post war years, it was an indoor event for national teams, played in Divisions with the winner being the top division champion and promotion and relegation between levels. GB played in it and typically played countries like Sweden, Hungary, Austria, Italy who took it seriously with most of the big European countries competing. Typically the Division would be 8 teams of 2 leagues of 4, with GB playing the other 3 teams both home and away over the winter months, with the top 2 team in each league going to a home and away semis and final. The matches  were 3 rubbers of singles and doubles. GB played quite strong teams, in my day Mark Cox, Buster mottram, John Lloyd, Andrew Jarrett all played. good thing was the venues, played indoors in Cardiff, Sheffield, Newcastle, typically venues that maybe held a couple of thousand folks. 

For other countries, it was below top, top level, but I know at times players like Borg, Noah, Rolf Gehring, Balasz Taroczy played in it. Generally it was being played with players ranked 50 or below, but recognising the top players in the 70's and 80's were often American or Australian and typically on the WCT Tour in the States. Most of the top European players played in it at one time or another.  

 

I have been trying to find out more information and possibly articles or  books on it from the web and there is virtually nothing. A couple of British Pathe reels, mentioned in passing in an Andrew Jarrett interview and also in an interview with ex Irish player Matt Doyle. But no wikipedia page, no history of it anywhere, no list of winners etc etc. My suspicion is the European tennis association ran it, as opposed to the ITF, but there is nothing there either. I recall GB winning it one year, but again can't find any information.

 

If anyone knows anything of it, articles, books, information that is more than the stuff above, please do post it here as I would love to find out a little bit more!

 

Many thanks !!



__________________
JonH


Satellite level

Status: Offline
Posts: 1220
Date:

Gosh - I happen to remember this competition too so this triggered my curiosity.

I have a full set of the really good (and much missed) World of Tennis annuals that were produced between 1969 and 2001 so Ive had a quick look. Should be able to research a bit more over the weekend but these annuals contained a list of winners and runners-up including scores etc. In some of the early annuals there were full articles on the competition from some of the respected tennis journalists of the time.

It might help to mention that it changed its name in 1985 to the European Cup although Ive done a quick internet search on that and nothing has come up.

When I have a bit more time I will see if I can find a quick way to get the winners on here although wont be able to go past 2001 as
sadly these annuals stopped being produced in 2001 (I had spent years tracking down and collecting the old ones that I didnt have) and they were replaced by media guides issued separately by the ATP and WTA. I have a full set of these too but there are no way near as informative! (Quelle surprise!) as anything in tennis not controlled by them doesnt exist. The ITF also produces an annual publication but I never bothered to collect them so it might be more information might be in those.

Hopefully will post something soon


__________________


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

Fantastic, look forward to whatever you can find !



__________________
JonH


Futures level

Status: Offline
Posts: 1854
Date:

https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=sv&u=https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/King%2527s_Cup_(tennis)&prev=search

and get a friendly swede to translate relevant parts of the swede tennis bible which hads all the kings cup results in https://ww.bokborsen.se/?_d=asc&_s=price&f=1&qi=9789163188206



__________________


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

Thanks Tom , I didn't think too try the Swedish version of wiki! So Britain won it 4 times, be interested to see when that was.

My big interest is in where we played our matches, I recall I'm sure , we played in Aberystwyth one year , but could be wrong.

BRITTAK, I also used to have all those world of tennis books, I recall John Parsons was the editor, and lance Tingay before him. Sadly I left them behind in some house move or other.

__________________
JonH


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

It's possible I'm also getting Aberystwyth confused with aberavon, one of the venues for the Dewar cup indoor circuit from the 70s.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dewar_Cup_circuit


__________________
JonH


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

Searching in Swedish helped me find one article from 1983
www.upi.com/Archives/1983/01/30/West-Germany-captured-the-Kings-Cup-indoor-tennis-trophy/8021412750800/


__________________
JonH
Jan


Hall of fame

Status: Offline
Posts: 7917
Date:

Ooh there's a blast from the past - I remember going to the Dewar Cup at the Royal Albert Hall!

__________________


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

Jan wrote:

Ooh there's a blast from the past - I remember going to the Dewar Cup at the Royal Albert Hall!


 Reading one of the reports in the Glasgow Herald, the Dewar Cup moved to Royal Albert Hall in 1970, from Crystal Palace (like chalk and cheese as venues - I went to Crystal Palace for a DC tie v Zimbabwe in the early 90's, indoor of course,  it was like a gym, horrible, with no food or such like). the article suggests that LTA  were criticised because the event wasnt being regarded as an Open event and apparently it was because it clashed with the LTA Covered Court event (as Indoor tennis was known in GB)   . I think the LTA Covered Courts were held at Queens Club, not sure, but were Open and on the Grand Prix circuit so would have attracted a range of top pro's and amateurs in the fledgling days of open tennis, I would guess a lot of the Aussies. So putting Dewar Cup Finals at RAH up against them, same week, seems like a bizarre call and shows tennis politics hasnt changed much in the past 50 or so years!!



__________________
JonH


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

And whilst I am getting away from the Kings Cup but getting all nostalgic, I found this from the old Scottish Championships played on grass

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Championships_(tennis)

In 1989, I am guessing at Craiglockhart, one John McEnroe won the event beating Jimmy Connors in the final 7-6 7-6. That would be not too dissimilar to Federer beating Nadal or some such in the final today.

And looking at the ladies, in 1981, the winner was one Judy Erskine (now Murray of course).

And on a similar front, the Irish Open back in the day wasnt too shoddy. According to references here en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Open_(tennis) the Irish Open was effectively part of the original grand slam , all played on grass, comprising the Irish Championships, Wimbledon (All England), US Nationals (now US Open) and the Northern Championships (no longer held as such but effectively what is now the Fusion 100 event held at Manchester, Didsbury, at least on the womens side of the game).

And not wishing to count our Welsh friends out, the Welsh Championships boasted a strong entry until around 1974, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Championships_(tennis) with  Ken Rosewall and Evonne Goolagong both winning around the early 1970's

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Championships_(tennis)

Add in big grass events in Beckenham (Kentish Times) (Connors beating Newcombe in 1977 or some such), Chichester (Stan Smith winning one year),  and then later places like Bristol and of course indoor events like Wembley (Benson & Hedges), Brighton (WTA event), Battersea and Birmingham (NEC hosted the WCT World Doubles for a couple of years after Olympia had it and then Royal Albert Hall of course), and Brum also hosted the Young Masters (like Next Gen but only held twice, Becker, Edberg, Jarryd, Nystrom, Sundstrom all played)

we have lost a lot of big tennis in this country. Hard to say things have got better over the past 40 years really... 

 

 



-- Edited by JonH on Friday 25th of January 2019 10:50:19 PM



-- Edited by JonH on Friday 25th of January 2019 10:53:04 PM

__________________
JonH


Satellite level

Status: Offline
Posts: 1220
Date:

It was fun getting all the old books out so as promised here is some info on the Kings Cup) :-


The Kings Cup was an International Mens Team Championship on indoor courts. It was staged on a knock-out basis 1936-38, not held between 1939 and 1951, home/away ties from 1952-74. It was not held in 1975 but was resurrected as the European Cup in 1976. That year was played on a round robin basis and the following year until 1983, ties were on a home and away basis. In 1984 the format changed again with all matches in one venue (spot any parallels here!!!). There was also a Challenge round in 1937.

France won the first competition with a certain Jean Borotra in their team!

Ive kept the rest of this focused on GB interest as it will take too long to compile full records but it doesnt look like GB entered until 1962 in any case.
In that first year we beat Norway 4-1 but then lost to Yugoslavia 2-3.
The following year, 1963, we beat Poland 5-0 and lost to Sweden 2-3.

Then we really ramp it up as we win the competition 4 years in a row!

1964 - beat Germany 4-1, Denmark 3-2, Belgium 3-0, Sweden 3-0
1965 - beat Norway 5-0, France 2-1, Denmark 2-1
1966 - beat Poland 5-0, Finland 5-0, Czechoslovakia 3-0, Italy 3-0
1967 - beat Germany 3-2, Yugoslavia 4-1, Spain 2-1, Sweden 2-1

Interestingly we seemed to play most of our ties away but with the SF and Final being played in one venue over a long weekend.

In the 1976 round robin format we finished runners-up (10 wins) to Hungarys (11 wins) with a team of Cox, J Lloyd, Mottram and Taylor.

We then didnt reach the final again until 1987 when we lost to Switzerland 1-2 having come through a group beating Italy and W Germany (team of Bates and Castle)

Ten years later (1997) we won it for a 5th time with a team of Martin Lee, Danny Sapsford and Arvind Parmas beating Germany 3-0, Czech Republic 2-1 and Netherlands 2-1 in the Final

The last year of records that I have are for 2000 when we were relegated from a Champions division having lost to Bulgaria 1-2 (team of Lee Childs, O. Freelove and Jamie Delgado)

Also just to note a Womens European Cup was created in 1986 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the mens competition. Sweden were the first winners.

GB won in 1992 beating Netherlands 2-1 in the Final (team of Clare Wood and Jo Durie).

GB also reached the final in 1989, 1990 and 2000 (Bally was in team that year). Again that is where my information runs out.

Wonder how much longer it carried in for - wonder whether it might be in some of the iTF books?


Hope this fills a few gaps!!


__________________


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

Thanks brittak, that's really great. I think it did dwindle around 2000 and had no idea on the ladies front. The men's team is very strong isn't it, for gb, compared to our best at the time.

I recall Germany had a player in the final you mention called Michael westphal I think, sadly he died young , was a fine player. I'm sure lendl and smid , slozil etc played for the Czechoslovakia team as well.

__________________
JonH


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

Also 1976, what a gb team. John Lloyd of course only weeks later went from cold, indoor courts in Europe, down to oz and reached the Australian final where he lost to gerulaitus. Before the 36 years of pain!

__________________
JonH


Tennis legend

Status: Offline
Posts: 40727
Date:

Gerulaitus does sound very painful.

__________________


All-time great

Status: Offline
Posts: 6109
Date:

indiana wrote:

Gerulaitus does sound very painful.


 He of the famous quote " no one beats vitas gerulaitus 17 times in succession" when having beaten Jimmy Connors at Madison square garden in the masters after 16 straight losses when trying to explain how come he'd won this time. 

 

At Madison Square Garden in 1980 he ended a run of 16 consecutive defeats against Connors. Asked how he had finally managed to overcome his nemesis, Gerulaitis famously replied: Because nobody beats Vitas Gerulaitis 17 times in a row.



-- Edited by JonH on Monday 28th of January 2019 10:04:27 PM

__________________
JonH
1 2  >  Last»  | Page of 2  sorted by
 
Quick Reply

Please log in to post quick replies.

Tweet this page Post to Digg Post to Del.icio.us


Create your own FREE Forum
Report Abuse
Powered by ActiveBoard