means to people,” said Jan Francke, president of the Swedish Tennis Federation, who is among the contenders to succeed Brian Tobin as president of the International Tennis Federation next July.Tobin saw Swedish television’s action as part of a wider problem. The match between Thomas Enqvist and Italy’s Renzo Furlan during last year’s semi-final was cut for a children’s programme, and none of the monumental 1996 final against France in Malmo was shown live.”It seems that they don’t understand what the Davis Cup… It had been jammed by irate viewers complaining that coverage of Friday’s epic opening match between Magnus Norman and Andrea Gaudenzi had been cut off with the Swede serving at 5-4 in the fifth set.
Regional news programmes were shown in place of the dramatic climax to events at the Fila Forum, where Gaudenzi saved a match point and was then forced to retire because of a torn shoulder ligament when serving at 6- 6, 0-30.This was not the first example of Swedish television pulling the plug on the Davis Cup. The Italian No 2 was probably relieved that he was unable to take calls. By this time the switchboard at SVT, the Swedish terrestrial television service, had resumed normal service. The finished product should make for an even more rounded read.. AS THE arias subsided on Saturday with the realisation that Italy’s Davis Cup final campaign had ended in defeat after three matches, Davide Sanguinetti’s mobile telephone was stolen from the side of the court.
His innate honesty and candour are given veracity, courtesy of Rees’s undoubted skills. All too often Jenkins has been accorded robotic qualities because of his phenomenal, metronomic kicking ability, to a certain extent dehumanising him.There is no doubt that the statistics are an integral part of the man, and a stunning section at the end of the book attests to his forte. But co-writer Rees has managed to open the door on this particular No 10 and has brought out the inner man a little.The 27-year-old Jenkins has the good grace to admit that this autobiography only goes up to half-time. Ponty boys do not hold back.” Indeed they did not, and it all ended unhappily after that.For all the apparent macho posturing of that particularly unsavoury affair, Jenkins actually comes across very well.
And once the final whistle had blown on a disappointing and narrow defeat for the Welsh club, the frustration was frog-marched along to the Bar Toulzac where there was another, more serious flare-up.Jenkins says: “It emerged that the trouble had started when one of their players threw a bottle at our centre Jason Lewis and it hit him on the head.” Two wrongs.. as they say, but as Jenkins says, “.. to attack one of us was attack us all … French referees apply great favouritism to the home side…” And there is more in the same vein. Jenkins fans the flames by adding: “It is worth quoting Mexted at length because his words came true for Pontypridd in Dax, then in Brive.”The latter match overflowed with passion from both sides; it was also packed with punch-ups. In other words in home matches you kick the hell out of them and in away matches they kick the hell out of you The average French club is not expected to win away… It deals with the infamous Heineken European Cup tie in France between Jenkins’ club, Pontypridd, and the eventual winners, Brive. And it lays the blame firmly at the feet of the French.Worse, New Zealander Murray Mexted is quoted at length on French attitudes to the game in general.
