Dustin Brown, Next British player?

The Magician Santoro · Top national player

Dustin Brown, Next British player?

Maza1987 · Challenger level

I heard the end part of the story on bbc.
Never knew one of his parents was british. If so, I'm all for it.

I'm hope lta follow this up.

ForeverDelayed · Grand Slam Champion

I think Dustin has fallen out with the Jamaican tennis federation as well, so it perhaps is possible that he may want to play for GB, as he will certainly get a lot more funding if he did choose GB.

May be worth a follow up call but it would be a bit strange to see him representing GB.

Silver · County player

There's a Jamaican Tennis Federation? Jamaican it up, man!

...

THAT WAS AN AWESOME JOKE, ADMIT IT.

So, Alexander Popp, James Blake and now Dustin? Anyone else we wanna try and throw into the mix? Schiavone lived in London for ages, perhaps she should play for the UK in the Fed Cup!

[/cynicism]

The Magician Santoro · Top national player

To be fair James Blake was never gonna become british, I didn't follow tennis when Popp was around so can't comment. Whereas there is decent base for Dustin Brown to become british, better funding, no other jamaicans helping him in davis cup, better prospects of wildcards, more recognisable in the public eye within the UK etc etc

Maza1987 · Challenger level

Seriously, I would love it if we could make this happen.

On a side note, I bet his favourite donuts are one's with Jammin'.

LadyTigress · County player

Missed that interview seeing as I was at Queens on that day!

Dustin Brown is a fairly new name on my radar, so I'm not too sure about his game. However, if he has one British parent, it seems at least theoretically possible for him to switch over to us, and if he seems positive about the idea then it may come about. Will he be worth the poach? I doubt he'll be another Andy Murray, but he could steal the second man spot from Boggo, and if there's mutual agreement on DC he could be a decent first singles man for us on the team (not that we wouldn't all love to have Boggo back leading the team, but between the LTA refusing to pick him and then Boggo quite reasonably wanting to focus on getting his ranking up, his appearances as lead singles man at DC have got to be up in the air).

James · Satellite level

I met Dustin at the Manchester Challenger last year and having had a reasonably lengthy conversation with him he comes across as a genuine, humble & driven guy. The only concern that I actually harbour is that British citizenship would exert on him completely new levels of stress & pressure, particularily from the press (well.. the tabloids). At the moment he is laid back & relaxed on and off court, which are important constitutes of his game.. and surely 12 months of British tabloid journalism will squeeze that out of him.

Stay Jamaican Dustin, for your own good! hmm

But here's a pic for those interested (taken by me in Manchester 2009):

Josh · Challenger level

Well the cricket team borrowed a few players and won the world cup, he could be a oretty useful 2nd player in the DC, especially on the quicker surfaces.

steven · Tennis legend

The only time Dustin played DC for Jamaica was way back in 2003, where he had a 4-1 record in singles and 3-0 in doubles, having played all those rubbers in just 5 days.

In 2008, Jamaica (without him) managed to gain promotion to Americas Group II (i.e. the dsame level as we are now at, though I imagine the Americas groups are a bit weaker) but they lost their first match 5-0 to Mexico, winning just 21 games in 13 sets, and then faced a relegation playoff against the Netherlands Antilles, which they also lost 5-0 despite AHO no. 1 Rojer not being available.

However, it seems he would fall foul of 'Blofeld's Law,' having not reached the top 100 until after he turned 25.

SMC1809 · All-time great

Well in that case, we should adopt him, blame him for our previous DC defeats, cut his funding and then expect him to win the next DC tie. wink

steven · Tennis legend

SMC1809 wrote:

Well in that case, we should adopt him, blame him for our previous DC defeats, cut his funding and then expect him to win the next DC tie.

Sounds like a plan! biggrin

British_is_Best · County player

It certainly is an interesting prospect and I agree that the LTA should look at this very closely. Hypothetically speaking, if Dustin announced today he wanted to become a British player how long would it take until he could actually represent us in the DC?

-- Edited by British_is_Best on Friday 11th of June 2010 09:01:28 AM

steven · Tennis legend

I was wondering that too. If he actually has a GB passport (which Bouncy said he had after the interview, but which didn't seem that clear during the interview itself, where he just talked about his father having connections in England) and he hasn't played for Jamaica since 2003, you'd think it wouldn't take that long.

British_is_Best · County player

No you would have thought not, I have to admit I am very excited at the prospect of a 2011 DC superteam comprising of Brown, Boggo and Flemski! In all seriousness Brown would help enormously at the level we are currently at