Old fashioned tennis scoring or no?

September 5, 2011 12:57 PM

Tennis filter: Settle a bet - In your metapinion is it the older players you play with who call the score 3-4 instead of 30-40 and 5-4 instead of 15-40 or does this shortform scoring seem not to be related to the age of the player?

In my experience it's mostly the older (50+) players who do this but a friend disagrees.

posted by Cosine to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (8 answers total)

Might be the local dialect. I haven't seen either of the examples you use, but "5-40" for 15-40 is commonplace the last place I played regularly, though the under-50 players were the great majority there.
posted by mhoye at 1:06 PM on September 5, 2011

I've known a lot of players of all ages to call "5" instead of "15" and "0" or "oh" instead of love but almost never hear anyone shortening 30 or 40.
posted by ghharr at 1:23 PM on September 5, 2011

In my hood (San Francisco Bay Area) .. I hear 3-4 and 5-4 a lot from players who are a bit older than me (40). I also hear "Ad In" and "Ad out" at 30-40 .. or basically whenever anyone has a game point. I find that ... confusing.

I usually shorten 15 to 5, but that's it.
posted by duckus at 6:03 PM on September 5, 2011

Hm. We used the shortened form when I played high school tennis in the Midwest, and I'm only 34. We did it because it made us feel cool and "in-the-know".
posted by web-goddess at 6:09 PM on September 5, 2011

I tend to use the short form later in the match as I wear out.
posted by jmsta at 6:44 PM on September 5, 2011

I'm 30ish tend to only do the "5", and almost entirely when I'm up (30-5 and 40-5). Dunno why, though.
posted by Dr.Enormous at 6:51 PM on September 5, 2011

I'm 31 and have mostly played with people roughly my age.

Played with a gentleman in his sixties last month and heard "15" shortened to "5" for the first time in my life.

This is in Canada.
posted by 256 at 9:28 AM on September 6, 2011

Grew up in CA and used 5 and Ad in/out my whole life. I'm 38.
posted by Joseph Gurl at 2:57 PM on September 9, 2011