Wimby Wild card

Armchair · County player

Wimby Wild card

Count Zero · Tennis legend

they are not going by the old flegate rules, where by you were allowed a max of 3 unless you were top 150, coming bakc from injury etc.

they will still give brits wc's, but decide on who deserves them

a quick guess would be boggo if he needs it, bloomers, baker, goodall.

Armchair · County player

Ahh sigh of relief, thought I'd got it wrong

goldenboy · Club Coach

ur right armchair! but prob missed a small trick!

their getting rid of the wimbledon wild-card playoffs, which give at least one wild card to british players who come through a mini-tournament against other brits prior to the tournie! is only for those who haven't already been automatically given a WC (naturally)

i actually think the playoff is quite a good idea, encouraging competitiveness, and rewarding winning 3 or 4 matches on the same surface. most of our "better" players get a WC automatically, so it gives some of the lesser lights a chance to shine. didn't lee childs come thru this a couple of years ago and go on and beat costa?

the lta have said that WC's will be more based on a world ranking approach. This is fair enough, rewarding consistency throughout the year, however I think that some of the lower brits deserve to get their chance to have a taste of the "big time", which the playoffs potentially affords.

johnnylad · Tennis legend

system still seems a little murky...

Sheddie · administrator

The LTA are going to nominate 8 British wildcards from the mens side and 8 from the womens side and then Wimbledon will award wcs to which (hopefully all) of these who they feel are deserving.

I'd guess on the men's side: Boggo, Bloomfield, Goodall, Baker, Mackin, Marray.....and then it kinda runs dry....wonder who will get nominated for the final 2, maybe the LTA will just choose those 6 as there's no one lower down who particularly deserves one, if they're definately choosing 8 then maybe Morgan Phillips and Lee Childs will get nominated but I can't see Wimbledon giving wcs to either.

There will still be a wc playoff, but this year, the winner will only get a wc into the qualies so I guess that if they've not been given a main draw wc, the top 6 mentioned won't bother with the playoff, making things a lot more open to players further down the rankings.

On the women's side: Anne K, South, O'Brien, Borwell, Keen, Cavaday, Stoop and Bally.

Sheddie · administrator

goldenboy wrote:
i actually think the playoff is quite a good idea, encouraging competitiveness, and rewarding winning 3 or 4 matches on the same surface. most of our "better" players get a WC automatically, so it gives some of the lesser lights a chance to shine. didn't lee childs come thru this a couple of years ago and go on and beat costa?

the lta have said that WC's will be more based on a world ranking approach. This is fair enough, rewarding consistency throughout the year, however I think that some of the lower brits deserve to get their chance to have a taste of the "big time", which the playoffs potentially affords.

I have thought that the playoffs are a good idea....but I also do agree with the LTA's view for scrapping them: they feel that they enable situations like last year to occur, when Delgado won it and got a wc despite having done virtually nothing else singles-wise for the past year ! They want wcs to be down to performance over the entire year rather than just a couple of days at Raynes Park.

It makes little difference at the moment on the mens side as the winner of the playoffs would come from the players ranked between Boggo and Mackin, and those players will be nominated for a wc anyway due to their rankings.

On the womens side, there's more strength in depth and several players lower down could have come through and caused an upset in the playoffs...likes of Jane O'Donoghe, Karen Paterson, Natasha Khan, Anna Smith etc