The Knight wrote:

---

Watson isn't Scottish she's from Guernsey

---

 Wimbly does in fact justify the decision to put her in the Scottish camp (although with a rather dubious reasoning )

 

No-one show Nicola Slater this thread.

Well, Hev was looking Scottish as heck in the first set versus CSN in Rome just now. Hoping she'll reclaim her "British" status in the second ;)

indiana wrote:

---

wolf wrote:

---

No-one show Nicola Slater this thread.

---

 Well, the 2010 Scottish Commonwealth Games selectors infamously seemed to forget Nik existed  

-- Edited by indiana on Wednesday 13th of May 2015 04:03:36 PM

---

That's what i meant, she wasn't too happy when Jocelyn Rae suddenly became Scottish.

-- Edited by wolf on Wednesday 13th of May 2015 05:25:20 PM

indiana wrote:

---

Well, Nik certainly had an issue with Mhairi Brown's Commonwealth Games selection. And folk may well ask "Who?"

---

 Not of course to be mistaken with Mhairi Black, who did rather well last week in another profession.

Ignoring the personnel on either side, it does seem to me that such a competition would introduce a welcome element of partisanship into the domestic tennis calendar. If Yorkshire, say, is playing Surrey, for example, for some "County Cup" - well who really cares?

The home internationals in football used to be the climax of the domestic footy season; and people who wouldn't know their Saracens from their Leicesters get all interested in the 6 Nations Rugby...

(I can't see a basis for a Wales nor Ireland/NI tennis team to compete with either England or Scotland - but glad to see any suggestions to the contrary)

And the UK domestic tennis scene seems to me to have lost its "pinnacle" event. It used to be Wimbledon - I was reading a PGWodehouse story the other day, where some minor character is casually described as making the last eight at Wimbledon - but that's back in the day when it took 3 months to get here from Australia. Wimbledon is now almost entirely the province of the international tennis jet-set.

If England played Scotland at tennis once a year, for some sort of "Calcutta Cup", I think you'd be able to sell an awful lot of tickets at a big hall in Glasgow - I think a load of Scots would see it as a bigger event than any Fed/Davis Cup match - and similarly in London, every alternate year.

Success would probably initially depend on Andy turning up, and possibly, but not necessarily, for a little less than his normal appearance fee for an exhibition. But for all the rest on the bill, and the LTA, and Tennis Scotland, it could be a lovely little earner. I could imagine the BBC wanting some broadcast rights, even. And they ain't ever going to broadcast the County Cup.

Also currently it looks like a really close contest; with quite a lot of evidence emerging now from at least the girls in Scotland that there could be a fine crop of "Murray dividend" future players to keep it interesting for a fair few years into the future.