Tony Bros on the July Davis Cup Pak vs NZL
18 people from around New Zealand were selected as linespeople
for the Davis Cup Tie in Hawera New Zealand vs Pakistan.
Tracy Hall did a very good job with arrangements, which included
Malcolm Strang and Neville Smith driving up from Timaru to
Christchurch airport, picking up Tony Brosnahan in Ashburton on the
way on the Thursday night prior. They met up with Christchurch's
Mattias Wieland in Wellington, and next morning they were
joined at Wellington airport by more Cantabrians - Richard Watts
and his daughters Ruth and Ana, and son Samuel, and also Matt
Laurie. Local David Crees was on hand to navigate one of the two
vehicles to pick up Rob Kwiatkowski, Francois Horion and
Ceedee Doyle on the way.
The two vehicles drove the 4 hours to Hawera, and had time to
check in at the Mount View Motel, meeting up with Miriama Flatt who
had made it up from Nelson, and the Northeners who arrived from
Auckland via New Plymouth airport about an hour's drive away. Chris
Temu, Deirdre Murray, Hansen Taufa of Auckland, and Hamilton's
Jacob Thomas completed the line crew, and we all
reported on time at The Hub stadium about 800 metres away.
The Hub is a magnificent new arena, only opened in March, and
the man in charge, ex Kiwi league star Howie Tamati hardly stopped
smiling all weekend, as did the workers and patrons in the
surprisingly cosy stadium.
We mad contact with our Auckland Chief of Umpires, Stephen
Noble, Tie Referee Asitha Attigaya of Melbourne(refereeing his
first tie), and our former lines colleagues Matt Burrell
(Wellington) and Dimitar Trifunovski (Dunedin/Auckland) who were in
the chair for their first tie also.
The first match was Rubin Statham vs Aqeel Khan, and after a
cautious start NZ prevailed in straight sets, which Dimitar was
very happy with. Next match pitted American raised Michael
Venus against Pakistan's heralded Aisam ul Haq Qureshi, who was
fresh from the Wimbledon doubles quarter finals, and expected to be
too experienced for Venus. However, after 3 hours, and a
lot of passion from all concerned, it was Venus on match points at
5-2 5th set, 15-40. An hour and a half later it was all over
(to umpire Burrell's relief), and Qureshi had saved 3 match points,
and served it out at 15-13.
It had been an 8.30pm finish, so a quiet night was our only
option, takeaway was all that was on offer by the time we made it
into downtown Hawera.
A sleep in on Saturday, and several of us took in the local
landmark Hawera's Water Tower, which is nearly 100 years old, and a
lot of history behind it's survival. The 215 steps up gave us
magnificent vistas of Taranaki, and the mountain was smiling on us
after a decent frost that morning.
The "crucial" doubles saw the Kiwis grab a set point on
Pakistan's serve in the first set tiebreak, but were unable to
convert. Khan and Qureshi proved too slick and controlled, taking
the match in 3 competitive sets.
Saturday's early finish gave us a good lead in to watch the All
Blacks vs Springboks match, and our Motel host Ron, met most of us
down at the South Taranaki Club and signed us in as his guests
(what a guy!), and we had a sumptuous meal (wait time from ordering
was over an hour - we think most of Hawera ate there that night!),
and enjoyed an emphatic All Black victory for dessert. The club had
table tennis, pool and snooker tables for the enjoyment of the
patrons, and a number of the group relesed some competitive
tensions from the day's duties.
Next morning we checked out in readiness for the journey home,
stashing baggage in an unused room.
Crews were left the same as the previous day - Stephen said
there was no point in changing anything that worked well. The
number ones led out, and after an even start, Statham gained the
upper hand, and strangled Quereshi into a tired submission, leaving
Aqeel Khan to save it for Pakistan. A tactical twist saw Austin
Childs brought in for a weary Michael Venus, and when our crew
changed at 2-1 on serve in the first set, Childs was struggling on
serve, and had saved break points. Half an hour later, he had won
the set 6-1, and was up a break in the second. Childs went on to
take the glory, much to his teammates' pleasure (and relief), and
NZ was through to play Thailand in September!
Our crews said our goodbyes, with Francois heading north with
the 4 others, and the rest of us 13 headed for Wellington again,
arriving 9-ish at night after a few dropoffs around the city.
A quiet night in the Brentwood Hotel, up early to see a little
of the World Cup Footbal final between Holland and Spain, and it
was shuttle to the airport, and Pacific Blue to Christchurch (after
a 30 minute delay on the tarmac while they took a stray suitcase
off!).
Overall the crews did very well, several who were working their
first Davis Cup Tie gained confidence as the weekend went on, and
generally everyone was pretty happy! Well done team!!