In Div 1B today:

Billy Harris won his match for Annecy in a MTB against Florian Lakat (a pretty high ranked French lad from the US college system)

Josh Paris won his too, just.

Neither played the dubs but the team won 6-0


St Malo (the team of Stuart Parker and - in theory - Scott Clayton) won by walkover

In Div 3, Capdenac (the team of Marcus Willis) won 6-0 by walkover.

Dan Cox won easily, in singles and dubs, and the team won 6-0

Damon ROberts also won, both singles and dubs and his team also won 6-0

Josh Goodall also won his singles very easily against a decentish player, and his dubs, and his team won 4-2


In Div 4, Tom Farq. kicked butt, winning his singles and doubles, and the team won 5-1

-- Edited by Coup Droit on Sunday 3rd of June 2018 11:22:27 PM

In Div 3:

For Capdenac, Jack Carpenter lost just, then withdrew from the doubles as the team had already lost. Team lost 0-6 and ends up third.

Dan Cox's result is not in yet.


In Div 4:

FOr Niort, Tom Farq won nicely, in both singles and doubles. Team won and finishes first and so will be promoted to Div 3. Well done all !

Not really sure, Born2win, to be honest, about recruitment. I think the player approaches the team, in practice often based on previous connections i.e. they know someone playing at that team (maybe Brit, maybe not) and the connection is made that way. I doubt many happen out of the blue.

Team applications to the FFT go in in October so all the players will be contacted by then (by the club) to check general availability/willingness to play. At end-April (before the season kicks off) the captain will be in touch to check availability for each weekly match and will do a team list - although those can be changed).
I note that certain players are re-entered every year who - presumably - have almost no chance of playing, for instance Farris. That means the team has renewed Farris' licence, taking him as an example, and - even if he hasn't been in contact - they've put his name down because the rule is that someone not on the list cannot play so they put him down just on the offchance. (However, you can't be on the list for team 1 and then play for team 2 so it's a juggling act for the clubs - they have to put enough players down for team 1 to cover possible absences but not so many that they end up depleting team 2 and 3 etc.)

As far as I know, there's no rule at all about the ranking of players. However, there is a rule about new players. Firstly, as above, you can't add a new player mid year - they're down in October (with FFT licence) or not at all. Secondly, more importantly, only two new arrivals can play in any team/be on any team list. (Five singles, two doubles). So you can't suddenly just 'buy' a whole new team.

Not sure about standard re Germany. May well be about the same. But I don't think Germany can be better - the elite divisions in French team tennis (which play in late autumn) are pretty much ATP 100-200 level, with quite few top 100 thrown in too - the final this year had Chardy, Barrere, Fabbiano, Stakhovsky, Halys..... And other teams had Paire, de Schepper, Gilles Muller, Bedene, Sousa, Albot, Basilashvili, Tsitsipas, Mannarino, Benneteau, Simon, etc. etc.
You also find very good players playing in quite lowly divisions because they often play for their original home team, it's very dear to the heart, and so don't care if they're the only really good player and that team is in Div 3 or whatever.

Yes, I saw that CD. The only two matches Lucy has lost this year. Indeed, the only sets she has lost, singles or doubles.

John Millman is one of my faves following his wonderful fairplay at Queens against Mahut.

And he highlights how wonderful European league tennis is - the German league, in his case, with 5,000 (!!!) spectators for the local club derby match.

John Millman

Verified account

@johnhmillman
4h4 hours ago


"DTB (German Tennis Federation) Bundesliga never ceases to amaze me. If it werent for it I would never have been able to start playing professionally ten years ago. Today nearly 5000 people came to watch the Mannheim-Weinheim derby. Team tennis is so good."


It also highlights that European league tennis is on offer to all. Millman needed it to be able to make it as a pro. Practically all French/German/Belgian/Italian/Spanish etc. players play it. It's part of the annual budget calculation. I have very little sympathy for GB players who complain about money but do not play league tennis. I'm not an expert on German DTB tennis but when I look down the results list that I find on their site for today I can't see any British names.....

Top elite team tennis kicked off in France last weekend.

Big news is that Dan Evans turned out for Colomiers against TC Strasbourg.

He played number 4.

Bad news is that he got his backside kicked by young Dan Added.

Dan Evans lost 2-6 1-6

He also lost in the doubles, playing with kenny de Schepper, against Added and Olivetti.

-- Edited by Coup Droit on Wednesday 14th of November 2018 09:44:21 AM