This interview on the BBC website this morning. I find many of the comments and quotes rather extraordinary - vague, misleading, disingenuous - in fact much of it reminds me of the leader of the London Olympics "Deliverance" Committee on the brilliant comedy 2012 - "so that's all good!" I've also printed some of the choice lines, and tried to translate what Simon meant after all the "code" in bold....please forgive me.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/21040629

"Despite Andy Murray's defeat in the Australian Open final, British elite tennis is in its best health for decades." Really? We have Andy, Laura and Heather - all developed outside the LTA - and then there's......hold on a minute

"Developing a British tennis elite is only one part of the brief for governing body, the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA). An equally important part is the LTA's drive to increase grass-roots participation, a quest given extra focus by demands from funding body Sport England to see tangible results in this area." Our performance in this area has been appalling, with a measured decline in participation, and Sport England has given us a massive shot across the bows in Public.

"We are establishing tennis as a game for everyone. That means getting more people playing tennis, watching tennis, and playing and competing more often. We are looking at how we can accelerate that growth." For men we have removed all $15k events, and removed all Challenger events except those on grass in June and July, and are publicising all remaining events with images of champagne glasses, corporates and our core audience of middle aged middle class people, just look at the LTA website - this strategy should be more profitable. Outside June/July and away from grass, tennis doesn't matter.

"We want to get people physically and emotionally involved with tennis, whether it be playing, or watching, or through the LTA's website". David Brent anyone?

"Mr Long points out that there was an 18% growth in weekly tennis participation last year. And Sport England agrees that "frequency of participation has increased" over the past 12 months." I'm sure Sport England gave the LTA an unreserved boll**king for its underperformance on participation, with a lecture on the need to understand its product and marketplace.....obviously we were all misunderstanding this, and they are in fact delighted with the LTA. Obviously if less people can afford tennis than before, those that do play can now play more often if they choose to do so.

"However for its funding purposes, it measures participation against a baseline of participation in 2007. And it has said that it may reduce the amount of cash for tennis that it allocates to the LTA, if there is not a further increase in participation." Sport England is being unfair, because it chose the start point of the new LTA regime's tenure to measure growth/decline in participation and not a start point which proves whatever the LTA wants the message to be. 

"We are stepping back from the coalface to look at what consumers want and to consider how people use their time in terms of sporting activity," says Mr Long. David Brent again - totally meaningless, but I think this is a reference to Sport England complaining that the LTA was completely out of touch with the marketplace, and arrogantly sticking with its same old products - so we'll commission some research into what people do with their free time!

"Sport England is an important source of funding for us. We are actively working with them". If we don't pull our finger out and do what they told us to do this time, they will cut our funding even more, and tell everyone what a bad job we are doing once again

"We realise we haven't got everything right. But it is a very competitive [leisure] marketplace." It's not our fault - everyone likes football

"We are already working with the leading players. The success of Andy Murray, Laura, Heather... and others, is a fantastic beacon... driving media coverage," says Mr Long. Thank god for those 3 - it drives lots of free marketing and press coverage - like this piece.

"We are lucky to be on the cusp of golden era of British tennis, with not only success at the US Open but also at Olympics and Paralympics" OMG - why would anyone say something like this, British tennis is more than just the success of 3 people, 2 of which haven't actually won anything significant yet - look at France, Spain, Russia, Germany, Italy, etc for both quality and quantity. If Marcos Baghdatis won a Major, would it be right for the Cypriot "LTA" to talk of a golden era for Cypriot tennis? No!!!

"But we are a grass roots as much as an elite organisation, and we are trying to combine the two in a cohesive way." Really?

"I am not going to pretend that we have totally cracked this - there are positive perceptions about British tennis and some more challenging ones," he says, referring to the fact that some may incorrectly see tennis as a middle-class sport. Tennis isn't a middle class sport, its a sport. Unfortunately it is correctly seen as middle-class dominated in the UK, and the LTA has been either unable or unwilling to do enough to change this

"Mini-tennis is creating a pathway into the game," says Mr Long. David Brent again.

As part of his commercial brief, Mr Long, a former sales development director at Diageo, welcomed new sponsors to the LTA in 2012, including Moet & Chandon, Optimum Nutrition, and Ricoh. I'm sure Moet and Chandon will help dispell those misplaced middle class brand perceptions of tennis in the UK.

"We are now in a position where we can proactively look to the next phase of really engaging with players and fans - from the ages of three to 83 - up and down the country. David Brent again - what does this actually mean - it's a soundbite without any specific actions or strategies attached?

"We are in good shape but in no way complacent." Oh Oh. This is beyond scary.

Am I being harsh? Maybe a little, but the irony of so much of this won;t be lost on many of us GB tennis fans