Quotations About Tennis

Though your game is hardly the best
You can fray your opponent's nerves
By methodically bouncing the ball
At least ten times before your serves.
~Arnold J. Zarett


Why has slamming a ball with a racquet become so obsessive a pleasure for so many of us? It seems clear to me that a primary attraction of the sport is the opportunity it gives to release aggression physically without being arrested for felonious assault. ~Nat Hentoff



The primary conception of tennis is to get the ball over the net and at the same time to keep it within bounds of the court; failing this, within the borders of the neighborhood. ~Elliot Chaze


What a polite game tennis is. The chief word in it seems to be "sorry" and admiration of each other's play crosses the net as frequently as the ball. ~J.M. Barrie


Tennis is not a gentle game. Psychologically, it is vicious. That people are only just beginning to come to terms with this fact illustrates just how big a con trick has been perpetrated on the non-playing tennis public - and even a few players, usually losing players - for decades. ~Richard Evans


Speed in tennis is a strange mixture of intuition, guesswork, footwork and hair-trigger reflexes. Many of the players famed for quickness on court would finish dead last in a field of schoolgirls in a race over any distance more than ten yards. ~Eugene Scott


In tennis the addict moves about a hard rectangle and seeks to ambush a fuzzy ball with a modified snow-shoe. ~Elliot Chaze

It's difficult for most people to imagine the creative process in tennis. Seemingly it's just an athletic matter of hitting the ball consistently well within the boundaries of the court. That analysis is just as specious as thinking that the difficulty in portraying King Lear on stage is learning all the lines. ~Virginia Wade


It's one-on-one out there, man. There ain't no hiding. I can't pass the ball. ~Pete Sampras


Tennis belongs to the individualistic past - a hero, or at most a pair of friends or lovers, against the world. ~Jacques Barzun


I have always considered tennis as a combat in an arena between two gladiators who have their racquets and their courage as their weapons. ~Yannick Noah


Love is nothing in tennis, but in life it's everything. ~Author Unknown


Tennis is an addiction that once it has truly hooked a man will not let him go. ~Russell Lynes


Ladies, here's a hint. If you're up against a girl with big boobs, bring her to the net and make her hit backhand volleys. That's the hardest shot for the well-endowed. ~Billie Jean King


Good shot, bad luck, and hell are the five basic words to be used in a game of tennis, though these, of course, can be slightly amplified. ~Virginia Graham


When I was 40, my doctor advised me that a man in his 40s shouldn't play tennis. I heeded his advice carefully and could hardly wait until I reached 50 to start again. ~Hugo L. Black


The serve was invented so that the net could play. ~Bill Cosby