Cochet & Co.

On the Scoreboard at the Stade Roland Garros, near Paris last week the blank space reserved for the name of the Davis Cup winners was barely big enough for the word FRANCE, too small for the name of France's opponent in the challenge round, GRANDE BRETAGNE. The painter of the signboard explained how this had come about. He had reserved a space just big enough for ETATS UNIS for the winner of the matches between the U. S. and England. When England amazingly beat the U. S., he had to use GRANDE BRETAGNE instead. There was no room to use it again if England, even more amazingly, won the challenge round.

The dilemma which might have faced the sign painter was avoided when France won, three matches to two. The first day, Henri Cochet, whose nickname, "Ballboy of Lyons," seems less & less appropriate as he gets more & more elegant, had a bad shoulder, but his game, recently off-form, had all its oldtime sparkle. He did not really start to play until "Bunny"' Austin had him a set down and 4-1. Then he took the match 3-6, 11-9, 6-2, 6-3. Borotra then made it look as if England still had a chance by losing to Fred Perry.

In the doubles, Cochet and his partner Jacques ("Toto") Brugnon had less trouble than the score, 6-1, 5-7, 6-3, 8-6, implied against Irish George Patrick Hughes and Charles H. Kingsley, former Oxford team captain, who used to give Perry a rest before his match with Cochet.

Borotra again made it look as though England had a chance by losing to Austin --7-5, 6-3, 3-6, 7-5. The sequence of matches so far had exactly followed that of the England v. U. S. matches a week before. Could they follow the same sequence for one match more? For a time, the sign painter must have been worried. Cochet won the first set 6-4, dropped the next 1-6, had trouble in the third when Perry, who learned his slamming, acrobatic game on London public courts, killed Cochet's weak lobs and ran the score to 7-all. Then Cochet steadied and won-- 6-4, 1-6, 9-7, 6-3.

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