One of the pleasures of attending the international tennis tournaments in Auckland each summer is the chance to see a star of the future, sometimes the very near future.
Crowds at last year's ASB Women's Classic were captivated by a delightful Canadian teenager of Romanian heritage, Bianca Andreescu, whoupset Caroline Wozniacki and Venus Williams to reach the final. In September she won the US Open.
When this year's classic starts on Monday, Andreescu will be there, as will Wozniacki and the woman who has won the tournament the past two years, Julia Goerges. Those names represent the appeal of the Auckland Tennis' premier event, the mix of veterans with players on the verge of breaking out, and touring professionals who start their schedule in Auckland every year because the tournament director, Karl Budge, works hard to ensure it works for them.
He competes with several other cities in Australia that hold preparatory tournaments for the Australian Open in Melbourne. He probably cannot match all of them with money for the appearance fees big names receive, so he makes it his business, he explains, to make sure they enjoy their time in Auckland as well as getting what they need in their build-up for Melbourne.
The acceptances he can announce year after year attest to his efforts. This year he has enticed Serena Williams to return, hoping no doubt Auckland fans will forgive and forget her previous visit, in 2017, when she left in a huff after an early round loss, declaring the conditions the worst she had experienced. It had been a windy day.
Forgiven or not, she is a drawcard, seeded second to Andreescu who beat her in the US Open final. At least Williams did not handle that defeat badly, unlike the previous year's final in her home grand slam when she and the New York crowd behaved disgracefully.
She no longer dominates the women's game as much as she did then and might no longer carry the same expectations of herself. She has been a great champion and could win spectators' hearts next week.
Courtside seats are another of the pleasures of Auckland, for the spectators at least. If the players find the clink of glass and rattle of cutlery distracting as they power into a shot, they seldom let on. And what power they produce.
From every seat in a stadium, top quality tennis is a revelation compared to watching it on television. The camera cannot convey how hard players hit and how fast they have to react. Not so many years ago this was a feature only of the men's game but these days the women too hit very hard. Some players squeal with the effort, which is easier to understand courtside.
The following week Auckland will host the men's tour. It has not had a budding champion here since the teenager Rafael Nadal more than a decade ago. That is because Nadal, Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic have dominated the game ever since. Men's tennis is overdue for a new star. Maybe we will see him first in Auckland. It has happened before.
