the blindfold supper: the blind kid ranks high because he's blind — "Thorp tells that his excellence of…"
Thorp tells that his excellence of play is scouted by them to be his anticipation. As in the player Dymphna arrives at the necessary location well before the opponent player’s ball, through anticipation.
Context
The body-as-instrument logic pushed to its limit: a blind nine-year-old is "highly ranked" in his region, and the theory is that he's ranked high not despite blindness but because of it — "the highness of the ranking may be due to the blindness itself." The whole edifice of the sport — eyes tracking the ball — turns out to be dispensable, maybe even a handicap. Strip the eyes and a tennis body can become pure anticipation, floating to the ball's landing spot before it's struck. The instrument is refined by subtracting a sense.