Hi, I'm a little confused at why you may be coming round to their way of thinking?

I'm pretty sure its been said by multiple posters multiple times what a good thing it is that you've helped Marcus and others. And if I haven't said it already I add myself to that list, its a great thing that you've taken such time, effort and money to help!

The critique many people have made is about your communication skills and forum etiquette. Don't mistake that for lack of support. 

I've largely stayed out of the back and forth that's gone on but when you suggested you might stop posting I advocated that you stay because any insight into the background of the people you sponsor is great. I still stand by that but again I have to reiterate that you can't take any criticism of you or your personality to mean people here don't "support" British tennis. That's simply not true.

Edit: Heh it seems indiana got there first with pretty much the same sentiment as me.

Bob in Spain wrote:

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korriban wrote:

We can all be pedants when it suits us, myself very much included, but it becomes a tit-for-tat game in the end. Suggest we all go back down to DEFCOM 4, rather than ramp it up to DEFCOM 2! I'm sure Mr Lewis will adapt his game style to his opponents in time if that's what it takes to win!

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I couldn't have put it better myself.  And given the typos and grammatical errors I find when I read back my own posts, who am I to point out the errors in anybody else's posts.

So from now on, I am not going to point out any more errors.  I promise.

Oh. And by the way.  It is DEFCON (as in Defense Condition) and not DEFCOM 

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Come on Korriban!

A1 tennis academy wrote:

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Got time on my hands becaused worked my Bol..cks off for 30 years and built a successful team 

Don't think other directors have  seen the forum but they have witnessed the lack of support from LTA and petty local tennis politics .They feel there are more deserving  projects Outside of GB tennis and the posts on this forum are leading me round to their way of thinking . 

Sponsors for individuals in GB tennis are very rare and should be welcomed and supported at a time when many GB business 's are struggling . I have spent considerable amounts of time & effort looking for sponsors for other GB players and it's not easy . 

During the last 10 years I turned down the opportunities to sponsor 2 foreign players who both went on to win grand slams ( singles & doubles ) because I insisted they had to adopt GB nationality . That won't happen again ! 

I have now helped over 10 GB players and once this project reaches fruition its time for a change but I have my eye on an eastern European player that I think has top 10 potential I told her coach that I would only consider if she gained eligibility for GB in fed cup but I now have changed my mind .

Her coach is a former GB Davis cup player and said I do not want her mixing with women GB players because they have got the wrong work ethic he only works with foreign players & I am starting to understand why . 

 

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Just a Tinky-Winky point. I've heard some people call their wives odd things over the years, but "other directors" is one of the more unusual ones. You're a plc, and well done for building the business up, it must have taken a huge amount of effort (and fair enough that you now have some time on your hands if you have built up a good team around you), but being a plc means a list of current directors takes just a few seconds to find, e.g. http://www.companiesintheuk.co.uk/ltd/a1-pharmaceuticals-public-company, and it appears to be just you and her.

Ah, now I've got it. Maybe there are 4 directors - your lovely wife (who must be something of a saint, I imagine) along with, say, good Gary, bad Gary and crazy Gary 

Such a pity they took the Teletubbies off the air, isn't it ...

(ref. "good Goran, bad Goran and crazy Goran" - from Teletubbies-addicted Goran's own words, Wimbledon 2001 - no offence meant, I just couldn't resist )

More seriously, as I said yesterday, we are on your side as far as you helping Brits is concerned. It's fantastic that you are helping Marcus et al and even more fantastic that he seems to have seriously committed himself to playing on the circuit this year (no doubt the support has helped to enable him to stop dipping in and out of the pro tour, as he maybe seemed to do in the past) and that he is beginning to fulfill his potential, which has been clear to many of us since his junior days.

But you do seem to almost enjoy trying to alienate people who'd like to support you. That (as far as I can tell) is people's only problem. It probably doesn't help the LTA to take you seriously either. I'm certainly no apologist for the LTA (like any big organisation, I'm sure there are some great people there working very hard to make things better and no doubt some not so great and/or misguided people too) and I think the more constructive engagement there is between the various people who want to help British tennis improve, the better. But it does have to be constructive and coherent, else it is hard to blame the powers that be for not taking much notice. 

Anyway, who you sponsor and why is (obviously) completely up to you, but if you're going to be influenced in those decisions by an online forum (and going to try to guilt-trip the mainly intelligent and decent people on here into toeing some kind of line, though hopefully I'm just imagining that bit), well, words fail me ...

As someone said earlier, letting your players do most of the talking might be a very good PR move - Marcus, for example, clearly has a great sense of humour, and if (say) he does get into the main draw at Wimbledon next year, I imagine the media and public will take him to their hearts very quickly.

Of course, it's a pity that he needs to get to Wimbledon before the national media and wider public take much notice, but there's not much any of us can do about that. I hope that by highlighting British players' successes on Twitter (when I have nearly all the tennis journos in the UK following me) might do a tiny bit to generate a bit more interest from those who write about the sport by at least getting the players' names into their heads more often and associating them with success (it's no accident that I give more prominence to good results and try to put the best ones into some kind of context, while still reporting the bad ones in passing to maintain a bit of balance), but we all just have to do what little (in my case, very, very little!) we can. There do seem to be more positive stories about Brits playing tennis than there used to be, but that's mainly because the British players themselves seem to be believing in themselves a bit more and doing a bit more winning!

Anyway, (more than) enough of that from me - you can believe what you like about us and about British tennis fans in general - if you can't separate our support for you helping players (and respect for the fact that you have worked hard to build up the funds to enable you to do it) from our concerns about how you interact on here, then I'm sure no amount of rambling on from me will ever change your mind.

Apologies to the rest of the board for dragging this out a bit more - I promise I'm going to get back to the tennis on here now! 

Well said, steven.

Back on the tennis (smile), George will now go up to about WR 815 or so and Rob to WR 870 or so. Obviously new highs (well, very close for Rob), new milestones, a new platform to make a further move. It's all good . . .

Yup. Dave just broke and will serve for the first set. *5-4