With such players as Kumagae and Shimidzu, followed by S. Kashio and K. Yamasaki, and the late H. Mikami, Japan is a big factor in future tennis. 1922 will again see Japan challenging for the Davis Cup, and none but a first-class team can stop them. The advent of a Japanese team with such players will mean that this year we must call out our best to repel the Oriental invasion: so competition receives another stimulus that should raise our standard of play.
The probability of journeying to Japan to challenge for the Davis Cup is not so remote but that we must consider it as a future possibility.
CHAPTER XV. SPAIN AND THE CONTINENT
Spain
A new factor entered the arena of world tennis in 1921 in the appearance of a Spanish Davis Cup team. Among their number is a star who bids fair to become one of the greatest players the world has ever seen. A scintillating personality, brilliant versatile game, and fighting temperament placed this young unknown in the first rank in one year of competition.
MANUEL ALONZO
Seldom have I seen such wonderful natural abilities as are found in this young Spaniard. Here is a player par excellence if he develops as he gives promise. Alonzo is young, about 25, slight, attractive in personality and court manners, quick to the point of almost miraculous court covering. He is a great attraction at any tournament.
His service is a fairly fast American twist. It is not remarkable but is at least more severe than the average continental delivery.
Alonzo has a terrific forehand drive that is the closest rival to W. M. Johnston's of any shot I have seen. He is reliable on this stroke, either straight or cross-court from the deep court but if drawn in to mid-court is apt to miss it. His backhand is a flat drive, accurate and low but rather slow and in the main defensive.
His volleying is at once a joy and a disappointment. Such marvellous angles and stop volleys off difficult drives! Yet immediately on top of a dazzling display Alonzo will throw away the easiest sort of a high volley by a pitiable fluke.