From: The Racketeer 13, June 1995
Straight from the Horse's Ed
by Ed Petryczka
Edward Petryczka, our foreign correspondent, has many firmly held opinions about the state of world tennis, but doesn't mention any of them here.
G'DAY - Andy asked me in his usual quiet (silent but deadly) way to write a few words for The Racketeer. It was an offer I daren't refuse - after all Andy's pen is mightier than my tennis racket, and frankly I was getting fed up of waking up with horses' heads in my bed - even if I am an animal lover.
So how do I start. I had thought of going into my US Immigration problem at Boston airport and the two years of being stranded in Florida, but then I thought: no - let's wait for the movie to come out and we can get Malcolm to review it instead. That's all ancient history anyway and no one likes to read history, especially the really old stuff that's three years old. [Don't say that to Chris Weir -AL].
Or maybe the club members would like to know about the land down under and Australian tennis, my latest adventure. But I figured what with Neighbours and those other third rate TV shows about wallabies pretending to be kangaroos and flying doctors with 1970s haircuts and clothes, there's probably too much built in resentment- Who wants to know the ozone layer is so depleted that the sun stings you like millions of sadistic fire ants on a feeding frenzy, and that two out of three ozzies have some form of skin cancer. So I thought better of it, after all it's pretty depressing stuff (especially Neighbours) and who needs that - as if living in the UK wasn't enough grief, already.
Then I could emphasise the positive and eliminate the negative and say that Australia is truly the nicest country I've ever been to and that the people, beaches, cities and attitudes were above anything rd ever expected to see. It's a young, naive and genuinely friendly and safe country, and what's more it's English in character and not Americanised like every other country in the world, including this one.
Maybe the Racketeer readers would prefer to know that my next tennis adventure will be in India (Madras to be specific, and yes I do like curries). I'd started an academy in Nottingham but was scuttled by our glorious LTA, and after two years of American academies in tennis Mecca (Florida), I've been asked to set up a brand new one in another far-flung corner of our Empire, this time in association with India's very own tennis demi-god, Ramesh Krishnan.
Well I still don't really know what to write about. I could even write about tennis - but no, I don't think you'd go for that - my opinions are a little too anti-establishment and it would be difficult to publish what with all the words with no middles and words beginning with F and P. Anyway buy me a drink readers and I'll tell you anything you want to know, about how much fun it is to play tennis in America or Australia, Spain, France - need I go on, and even in the UK at nice little clubs like Mapperley Park.