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In Tennis, the first shot of any point is the serve. A second chance to serve is provided if the first shot is not within the defined serving area for the ball. Once in play from a legal serve, the ball must be returned after bouncing once, and thereafter hit back and forth by the two players – either by allowing the ball to bounce or hitting the ball before it bounces (called a volley). Serves are alternated between players after the completion of each game.
The objective is to use a Tennis racquet to direct a ball to an area of the court so that it cannot be returned to within prescribed boundaries by the opponent.
A game is a series of points. Players begin each game on 0 (called ‘love’), and with each point won follow a sequence of 15,30,40 and game (the winning point). If players are tied at 40 each (called ‘deuce’), one of them must score 2 consecutive points to win the game. The winner of the first of these 2 points is said to have the ‘advantage’.
A match is divided into sets, which in turn are made up of games. Matches can be organised to win based on gaining 3 sets out of a possible 5 (usually exclusive to the men’s game), or by gaining 2 sets out of a possible 3 (usually women’s and mixed).
A set is won when a player reaches 6 games, when there is at least a 2 game margin. Otherwise, when the game score is 6-6, a tiebreaker game is played out. Here, the first player to reach a minimum of 7 points with a margin of 2 clear points wins the game and the set.
A chair umpire, supported by a series of judges, officiate a Tennis match. The umpire and judges decide if the ball is hit outside the acceptable service and general play lines on the court, or if the ball hits the top of the net. The umpire announces the score after each point, and can reverse judges’ decisions and award penalties against players where appropriate. There is a final arbitration power given to the referee to resolve all issues between the umpire and players which could lead to a player being disqualified. A number of ball boys or ball girls run onto the court to retrieve a ball once a point is completed or a foul shot occurs to ensure the minimum of interruption in the flow.
Equipment
An outdoor or indoor playing surface is used. This can be made of either grass, clay, hard cement or synthetic material and is laid out with line markings to define service and court boundaries.
Racquets are to a maximum permissible size, with frames made from either wood, metal or composite materials. Balls are made of rubber and have a covering felt.
Changes in the style of the game have been directly linked to changes in the Tennis racquet itself, especially material composition and frame size - which have made strokes more powerful and accurate with more pronounced spin effects.
Court surfaces
Although Tennis was originally called Lawn Tennis due to being played exclusively on rolled grass, there are now a variety of other outdoor surfaces (each with their own characteristics) as well as indoor surfaces composed of hard synthetic material and rubber matting.
Different performance strengths and hence different players’ abilities become more decisive on the different playing surfaces as follows:
1. Grass is very fast and favours serve-and-volley skills - limiting the length of rallies from the baseline.
2. Clay generally leads to long rallies since the ball bounces very slowly. This allows a wider variation of shots to be used, and players can even slide on the surface when playing a shot.
3. Hard cement surfaces generate uniform and predictable bounce, unlike grass which is dependent on weather conditions and clay which has a more uneven surface.
4. Synthetic surfaces also generate excellent bounce and are less likely to cause player injuries since it can be flexible and springy.
The four open tournaments which make up the Grand Slam are the Australian (synthetic), French (clay), the US (cement) and Wimbledon (grass) “Opens”. The choice of surface for the Davis Cup and Federation Cup is decided by the host country.
History
Modern Tennis has its roots in the French game of Paume, for which rules were written in Paris in 1592. However, it was not until February 1874 that the game was patented and in May 1875, the 25 rules for play were defined by an Englishman, Walter Clopton Wingfield.
The first championship took place at Wimbledon, a suburb of London, in July 1877. The first international championships were held in the USA in 1881, in Australia in 1905 and in France in 1925. Tennis was part of the first Olympic Games of the modern era in Athens in 1896, but was withdrawn after 1924 and only reinstated in 1988.
Since 1913, the sport’s governing body has been the International Lawn Tennis Federation, which became the International Tennis Federation (ITF) in 1977.
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