THE district tennis community is in mourning after the sudden death of Cohuna stalwart, Greg Rodwell on Saturday.
Mr Rodwell, 64, collapsed a short time after his Division One team won the Northern District Lawn Tennis Association premiership at Barham. Efforts to revive him were unsuccessful.
His wife, Mary, another committed tennis player and official, was also a member of the premiership team.
NDLTA chairman, Wayne Hall led tributes, saying that tennis was one of Mr Rodwell’s great loves.
“Greg has always played with his heart on his sleeve and Saturday was no different,” he said.
“He was out there playing Division One for Cohuna and assisted them in winning the grand final and the prestigious Division One flag.”
Mr Rodwell was involved in three hard-fought men’s doubles matches, winning all three, before losing a mixed doubles game as Cohuna went on to win by 11 games.
He was a Cohuna resident for 28 years. He and his wife, Mary have operated a financial consultancy firm, G.C. and M.L. Rodwell’s Consultancy, for the past 25 years.
A passionate tennis player, Mr Rodwell had been involved with both the Cohuna Lawn Tennis Club and the Northern District Lawn Tennis Association since residing in the area.
He was a board member of each association, and was secretary and president of both for multiple terms, as well as being a board member for both, and he was a key organiser of the Easter tournament at Cohuna for 19 years.
Mr Rodwell was also a Victorian Country Tennis Association representative, referee, and committee member.
He represented Cohuna and Pyramid Hill in Division One inter-town tournaments, inter-regional tournaments, and won Victorian Country Week tennis tournaments.
He won 12 premierships in Division One and he has been the club singles champion nine times.
He also represented Cohuna at NDTLA championships and won singles, doubles and mixed titles.
Mr Rodwell was awarded life membership of the Cohuna Lawn Tennis Club in 2004.
Other projects included running the Cohuna junior tournament. Training young tennis players was a particular joy.
He shared his experience and knowledge as a junior players coach every Saturday morning from 1992 until last week.
His daughter, Michelle said yesterday that he gained immense satisfaction from seeing young talent develop and helping them move up in their tennis careers.
Mr Rodwell could be relied upon for anything that needed doing around the club and organised working bees to ensure everything was up to scratch, she said.
A proud and loving grandfather of five, Mr Rodwell was able to see his eldest grandson start playing competition tennis this year.
Mr Rodwell is survived by his wife Mary, and their three children, Travis, Michelle and step-son Darren.
