The Times and other media

The Hoose · Satellite level

The Times

mjd · Challenger qualifying

The Hoose wrote:
I'm not sure this is the argument as far as the LTA are concerned. Since they dish out loads of money to players anyway, .....................

They may 'dish out' to some selected players but to play for example one challenger the other side of the world and maybe gain 5 points can cost a fortune, just ask any of our MEP's how much it costs to travel and stay away from home biggrin

As the LTA have reduced the chances of Brits playing in the UK perhaps they should assist the travel abroad even more but looking into the future they should be concentrating on helping local events thereby increasing the number of young players into the game. Until they fix this and make tennis available for all any hidden talent will remain hidden.

The Hoose · Satellite level

I don't dispute that the costs of playing tennis are high. My point was merely that getting money for losing shouldn't be used as the excuse for not giving out a wildcard - because there are ways of adjusting other payments to compensate.

Count Zero · Tennis legend

guys, prepare yourselves for a shock, but here is a good article! in the telegraph:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/sport/jeremywilson/100000080/lta-and-not-the-players-must-take-blame-for-wimbledon-fiasco/

-- Edited by Count Zero on Wednesday 24th of June 2009 07:49:42 PM

The Knight · Challenger qualifying

wow....that was a good article! hits the nail on the head

indiana · Tennis legend

Very good article

I do myself still think that some of our top players don't make the best themselves of the individual talents they have, and help themselves be all they can be. This could still have been mentioned for balance.

But the more important balance was to put some very pertinent facts to balance against the rubbish in many of trhe tabloids, and in a short aritcle they very much pointed at the main problem, the LTA.

Why over so many years with the money they have available do we have such an appaling lack of depth compared to the other big western European nations France, Germany, Italy and Spain and to a quite a few more nations as well ?!

As the article points out you do have to feel sorry for these players who have worked there way to the top and find that ranked about 180 in the world, they are our second best man or about 50 our one real hope of anything much in the women.

How they would love sometimes to be able to go about their business with less spotlight, especially at Wimbledon. The fact that they can't is almost entirely down to the LTA. As far as I can see money, yes, but an absolute poverty of good thinking over many years.

-- Edited by indiana on Wednesday 24th of June 2009 08:46:21 PM

Count Zero · Tennis legend

the problem is, how do we know what talent the lta are holding back due to poor coaching methods etc? it wasn't long ago that andy ran as far as he could from them after basically witness their coaches single handedly destroy his brother's game!

Drew · Jun 24, 2009

Very good article and very fair. I like this guy.

But this kind of piece wont make-it to the BBC sport pages.

J-O the Beeb Tennis correspondent is a very good professional journo but fairly green in tennis matters IMO. Heard him today going on about the failures of the Brit players...he does have a go at the LTA but that is a given these days.

This guy spotted what we already know...its a complete lack of players going through the system. And the 'system' might be broken also??

mjd · Challenger qualifying

I also saw Tim Henman on TV tonight expounding his theories - he seems as much in touch with the real world of normal folk as does George Brown! God help us if he gets more power within the LTA, Greg is much more in touch.

Drew · Jun 24, 2009

mjd wrote:

I also saw Tim Henman on TV tonight expounding his theories - he seems as much in touch with the real world of normal folk as does George Brown! God help us if he gets more power within the LTA, Greg is much more in touch.

Who the hell is 'George Brown'....is that George Bush spliced with Gordon Brown...god help us if it is MJD !!!

Count Zero · Tennis legend

and mjd wonders why his votes for Daniel Cameron are never counted

mjd · Challenger qualifying

It's so funny that I wont even bother to correct my previous post disbelief

everyone can have a laugh at my expense.

By the way George Brown WAS deputy leader of the labour party for 10 years but you need to be my age to know that!

I also forgot to congratulate Jeremy Wilson for his excellent article in the TELEGRAPH the most realistic article I've seen in a long time.

-- Edited by mjd on Wednesday 24th of June 2009 10:00:59 PM

Drew · Jun 24, 2009

mjd wrote:

It's so funny that I wont even bother to correct my previous post everyone can have a laugh at my expense.

By the way George Brown WAS deputy leader of the labour party for 10 years but you need to be my age to know that!

I also forgot to congratulate Jeremy Wilson for his excellent article in the TELEGRAPH the most realistic article I've seen in a long time.

-- Edited by mjd on Wednesday 24th of June 2009 10:00:59 PM

You do know this article was posted 8 posts above...can we keep on s******ing please

steven · Tennis legend

mjd wrote:
I also saw Tim Henman on TV tonight expounding his theories - he seems as much in touch with the real world of normal folk as does George Brown! God help us if he gets more power within the LTA, Greg is much more in touch.

I agree that Greg seems to be a lot more in touch and quietly doing a pretty good job in his role at the LTA, but it's not wonder that Tim isn't in touch when (as far as I can gather) he's hardly spent any time with the lower-ranked Brits - maybe if he did start to work within the LTA, he'd start finding out. (Well, we can dream ... LOL)

Btw when I read that George Brown bit, I was thinking wasn't George Brown the Speaker when I was a kid, but no, that was George Thomas. However in checking that out, I found this about the new Speaker John Bercow:

"In his youth, Bercow was ranked Britain's No.1 junior tennis player. However a bout of glandular fever ended his chances of pursuing a career as a professional tennis player." (I can't find any record of him on ITF, but I guess their junior records don't go back that far)

Far more importantly, that Telegraph article is great - it's about time somebody outside forums like this realised that it's not the fault of players like Boggo and Josh taht our nos 2 and 3 are only just ranked in the top 100, the problem is that we don't have enough depth to produce anyone to go ahead of them.

-- Edited by steven on Thursday 25th of June 2009 10:09:52 AM

Ratty · County player

Dear oh dear, it's bash the LTA time again.

Dealing with the tedious Telegraph ramblings first, which are based upon 2 half-truths:

1. Jamie Murray was the 2nd best player in the world at the age of 13. This sounds like cr*p to me. It derives from a whinge about the LTA by Andy a few years ago, which he later retracted. There is no other "evidence".

I'm sure Jamie was very good. But I know of lots of Spanish and French players who were very good at 13, and they never made it either.

2. The good old cliche that Andy had to go to train in Spain when he was 15. Well, this is sort of true. His Scottish coach Leon Smith took him for a training bloc to Sanchez in Barcelona, and it is easy enough to see from the tournaments he played in 2002/03 that this would have been for about 4 months starting in August 2002. Yes, that is only 4 months, after 9 years training in the UK.

But Andy was already a world beater at that age, under the "cr*ppy" LTA system and his "useless" British coach Leon Smith, who now holds a senior position at the LTA. Along with lots of other foreign coaches with impeccable records of success in their previous careers. Are you all saying that these high achievers suddenly become useless when they step through the doors of the NTC?

And of course, although it's tedious to go on for too long, I seem to remember that when Andy gave his Sanchez coach Pato Alvarez the boot when he was 17, for not being good enough.

Pato was trying to get me to play in a way I didn't like and it just wasn't working. He wanted me to be less aggressive and play like the Spanish players. That's not the way I play. I like to play hard.

I don't know why Britain produces so few top class tennis players. I suspect it's because not enough 6/7/8 year olds take up the sport, in comparison with France, Spain, Russia, etc. And that could well be due to a comparitive lack of government support for sport in schools.

But hey, never mind trying to dig beneath the cliches, it's the first week of Wimbledon, with guaranteed headlines for making scapegoats out of old Etonian Pimms-drinking toffs at the LTA!