Te Anau has launched an audacious bid to bring an international Davis Cup tennis tie to the Southland town that has a population of close to 3000 people.

The 10th Te Anau Tennis Invitational was completed on Thursday with Rubin Statham beating Finn Reynolds 6-4, 6-1 in the final to again get his hands on the Willans Trophy.

It was Statham’s 7th Distinction Hotels Te Anau Invitational title in as many visits to the tournament. Impressively, he’s played in 21 matches in Te Anau over the years and won all of them.

Each December New Zealand’s leading men’s tennis players converge on Te Anau for the event with a prize pool of $25,000 put up for the 2022 Invitational. Statham took home close to $9000.

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Club president Greg Sheppard said they were not content with the annual Te Anau Tennis Invitational offering and has set the sights on getting a Davis Cup tie to Te Anau.

Sheppard said New Zealand’s bigger centres had been encouraged to bid for February’s Davis Cup match-up between New Zealand and Bulgaria.

In November, they made a late attempt to convince tennis officials that in fact, Te Anau would be the best place to host it.

“We put together what we thought was a pretty solid bid,” Sheppard said.

“We must have been considered. We had a rattle around and had a fair few sponsors on board ready to throw some loot at it.”

Te Anau tennis officials had gone as far as partnering with the Distinction Hotel in Te Anau and had rooms blocked out for the Davis Cup tie. They had also worked with Air Milford about sorting a plane to fly players from Queenstown to Te Anau.

However, it was Christchurch that ended up being chosen as the host city.

“The [International Tennis Federation] has to approve the venues, and they just couldn’t get their head around that a small town could host a Davis Cup tie,” Sheppard said.

“We would have been the smallest town to ever host one. But we are not scared of that, we would have turned it on.”

While Te Anau has been overlooked for the New Zealand-Bulgaria tie in February, Sheppard said the dream of Te Anau hosting a Davis Cup showdown remained alive.

He said they would continue to bid for future ties, and Te Anau has received the backing of New Zealand Davis Cup player, Rubin Statham.

“I’ve asked Tennis New Zealand to keep going and try to get us pre-approval for next time. We want one down here eventually,” Sheppard said.

The Davis Cup ties can get a bit lost in some of New Zealand’s bigger centres, but Sheppard was certain Te Anau would embrace it and would muster up a lot of support for the New Zealand team.

“We haven’t given up. It would be a bit of a coup, and I tell you they would get some support. I don’t think Te Anau has ever hosted a true international sporting event.”

“We don’t shy away from a challenge, and I’m certain it wouldn’t be a failure.”