grain of salt
Tennis athletes will soon be homeless – such nonsense!
“NZZ am Sonntag” writes that there will soon be no more indoor tennis courts in Switzerland. A gross exaggeration. At least for Eastern Switzerland.
Every day there are many reports that make you sit up and take notice. But this one in particular. “Tennis halls before the end – a sport becomes homeless,” headlined the “NZZ am Sonntag” yesterday. As the? Just a moment ago we were a tennis nation thanks to Martina Hingis or Roger Federer and now there will soon be no more courts?
But slow down. This headline is a typical phenomenon: you spot a problem in Zurich or Bern, where many journalists live, and think it affects everyone. There are actually a few halls in big cities that are coming under pressure because residential buildings promise higher returns. But in St. Gallen and eastern Switzerland there are no reports of tennis halls dying. The sport is anything but “homeless”.
That is probably also the reason why Eastern Switzerland is the only part of the country – thanks to Belinda Bencic! – advanced to the 4th round of the Australian Open. If it had rained constantly in the hall in Niederuzwil, where she learned her first shots, she would never have been such a good player.
