Britennis and The Britennis Podcast

BradMarx90 · County player

Britennis and The Britennis Podcast

The Optimist · ATP qualifying

Like the presentation of the player lists. Nice for people to be able to put faces to names - although some of the female photos are a bit out of date!!

A couple of picky things.

I only see female player lists and can't see a way to get to the male equivalents. Presumably this is because the male lists aren't on-line yet. *****

Personally, if a player qualifies for more than one list, I would like to see them listed in both e.g. Emma Wilson is listed in the college list but not in the top 100 LTA list, but qualifies for both.

In the college lists you have included Anastasia Reimchen who, although based in Britain before college, is a German national.

Also, you have listed Jennifer Brown as a senior at San Diego and linked to the bio of a US player of the same name. Jennifer is a sophomore at Mississippi State.

The female lists state that they are ordered, amongst other things, in ATP order rather than WTA.

Initially, I couldn't see what your proposed blog would offer over and above this forum but am now really excited to see how it develops!

Hope you don't mind the comments.....made in the best possible spirit!!

Edit: Found the men! Problem was I got to the female lists by clicking on LTA100 under most popular rather than from the menu bar........

-- Edited by The Optimist on Thursday 31st of December 2015 03:22:52 PM

BradMarx90 · County player

Thanks The Optimist! I knew there would be some mistakes along the way. Nice to have a second set of eyes over it all.

I will fix these tonight. I know some of the female photos are out of date, I'm hoping to, during my coverage, get some more up-to-date ones once I cover events and get interviews with the players. Working on it.

Will remove Reimchen. Not sure why I didn't spot that before.

Thanks!

indiana · Tennis legend

Very interesting and I will certainly be watching how this all develops.

Agree with The Optimist about not restricting players to one list. In particular this has the women's WTA top 1000 list ( a list that probably will interest more folk ) conspicuously missing Katie Swan plus Gabi Taylor and Emily Appleton I assume due to being juniors. Even if slightly altering such players' bios emphasis in different lists, I would particularly have the top ranked ATP and WTA player lists having all players.

-- Edited by indiana on Thursday 31st of December 2015 07:38:42 PM

BradMarx90 · County player

Thanks for the feedback.

How to present the players on the Players pages was a subject I wrestled with for a long time. I won't be changing them for now, but I'll see what the general reaction is once we're properly up and running, and I may then make changes. I appreciate that while it does state clearly at the top of the WTA lists that players born in '98 and later are on the Girls list, it does mean Swan, Taylor and Appleton are absent.

It's tricky when you have so many different ways of ranking people.

The Optimist · ATP qualifying

With the lists, it makes sense to me for all players, regardless of age to be included on the ATP/WTA lists. It's probably where a site visitor with a general, as opposed to my completely nerdy, interest in tennis would look to find out who our pro players are. Same thing with the LTA top 100. Without specific knowledge of the UK tennis scene, it's probably where I would look to see if there was anything on a player I had seen at a club or a local tournament. Most people using this forum have an idea of the ages of our better young players, but those with a more general or passing interest in tennis probably do not.

I see the college and junior lists as subsets of these 2 main lists, a shortcut should you have a specific interest in a given category of player (or a nerdy obsession like some of us on here!).

Shhh · Challenger level

A huge well done Brad on the site and what you are trying to achieve, the very best of luck.

Am very impressed with the look, layout and content for the launch site. My only negative feedback was that the links I clicked on (Brits in wildcard action for eg) required a bit of reading though to get the gist of the news. If I have settled down for a good read then fair enough but, when online I am usually after the information as quick as possible, and only then read further if I choose. Does that make sense....or am I talking nonsense.....I often am.

Well done again.

BradMarx90 · County player

Thanks Shhh for the feedback. I'll be sure to give the main news in the top section as much as possible to avoid you having to read too much. wink

Kenneth · Lower Club Player

Like the new site and the updates. If I can just suggest that moving forward, less is more sometimes, especially regarding Twitter. Look away and my timeline is full, not sure telling us that a low ranking junior has lost in qualies of an ITF junior event merits several tweets!
Want to keep getting the updates but just feels like a bit of overkill.
Hope all goes well!

BradMarx90 · County player

Thanks Kenneth! Trying to get the word out as much as possible, but will agree to Tweet less often.

Thanks for following!

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

As a mega fan of junior tennis, I do rather agree with Kenneth - it's a balance but G4 junior qualis, or whatever, isn't that high on the list.

But great site. I've bookmarked it

BradMarx90 · County player

Thanks CD! I think I'll focus on promoting the featured articles during the day, and ease off on the Twitter updates about G4 Juniors. Worth having small match reports or daily summaries from these Junior event on the website, though, right? Obviously the idea is to cover as many levels as possible.

The huge Twitter presence is simply to drive initial readership. It's going well so far, because people are seeing us and visiting the site because they're curious, but further down the line, once we have a solid, regular readership, it won't be so necessary. Some people like it, others don't, I've had feedback both ways. Trying to find a good balance, as you say.

Great to have feedback of course.

Kenneth · Lower Club Player

Yes love the junior coverage, and nothing wrong with one tweet say on the said grade 4 qualies but not several. Really liked the summary from Graves last week, events like that get no coverage so was great to see. Assume you've emailed/tweeted all main training centres etc so they know you are there? They should be a great source of free info as they will get publicity for their players in return.

BradMarx90 · County player

I am doing so as the events come up, rather than en masse. That way, I figure people are more likely to be looking for publicity opportunities.

christ · Futures level

Ad placement can be a bit unfortunate (Safari on a mac)

-- Edited by christ on Tuesday 5th of January 2016 11:30:50 AM