Shabbat decision riles tennis club
THE Maccabi Tennis Club has been forced to forfeit its grand final after Tennis Victoria refused to accommodate the team's observant players by moving the Saturday fixture to a different day.
ADAM KAMIEN
THE Victorian Maccabi Tennis Club has been forced to forfeit its grand final, after Tennis Victoria refused to accommodate the team’s observant players by moving the Saturday fixture to a different day.
The club, which has played all of its other matches this season on a Sunday, has launched an appeal with the Equal Opportunity Commission in a last-ditch attempt to have the decision overturned.
Maccabi’s opponent in the final, East Burwood, originally agreed to move the grand final, but later said it was unable to play on a Sunday.
Maccabi then appealed to Tennis Victoria to intervene, but the roof body upheld the decision.
Sonia Slonim, Maccabi Tennis Club secretary and the mother of one of the team members, lodged the appeal with the Equal Opportunity Commission and said she was confident of a decision in her club’s favour.
“[East Burwood] refused to change it and Tennis Victoria said there was nothing they could do. I said ‘you’re discriminating against us’. The Equal Opportunity Commission said we have a case,” Slonim said.
“We’re going to fight it because it’s really not fair. It’s not a Saturday competition; it’s a Sunday competition. If you play all year on a Sunday, the final should be on a Sunday.”
Tennis Victoria competition coordinator Chris Larkin told The AJN the grand final could not be moved because of scheduling conflicts that might arise.
But Larkin admitted Tennis Victoria had not yet contacted Maccabi’s opponent to determine if an agreement could be reached.
“I haven’t even consulted the opposition to whether they would play it at another time in the next couple of weeks … I’m certainly happy to do that,” Larkin said.
“The difficulty is that you start to get precedents set, where you set it for one scenario and then you’re opening up a precedent that everybody then can start choosing when they’re available to play and when they’re not available to play.”
Maccabi Victoria president Miles Clemans said Tennis Victoria needs to be more flexible when it comes to accommodating the needs of religious groups.
“We’d like to point out to Tennis Victoria, as we have to other sporting associations, that they should accommodate the needs of diverse religions,” Clemans said.
“There are other sporting associations that have accommodated our special needs and we ask that Tennis Victoria do the same.”
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