Frustratingly the element of truth in the pi** taking burns brightly. The lack of diversity is frightening it echoes the gentleman and players ethos of many traditional English sports, professional Rugby, Cricket and virtually all Olympic Sports are still skewed by equity of access. Although tradition is one of the strengths of English tennis, the old tennis clubs although probably not intending to be do intimidate those from non tennis or for want of a better word middle class backgrounds.

Really important to tackling this is the barriers to access and who knows perhaps the players that have had to overcome them have had the opportunity to feedback. It strikes me that unless your family play or coach it is unlikely you will play. There is an enormous amount of tennis resources in South West/West London, (Surbiton,Queens, Wimbledon the NTC).

On Friday night I watched some of the best young athletes in South East London at Blackheath Rugby clubs new 4G astro, just off the A2 and Blackwall tunnel, close to 100 kids 8-14 of variable ethnicity and socio-economic backgrounds, £7 and your in, pay on the door, 90 minutes of high quality dedicated skills sessions. Non will play rugby, they were all under the tutelage of UEFA B coaches, I would be very surprised if more than 2 had seen a tennis racket. Millwall have now taken the lease so it will move on but all their boys I presume will join the Charlton boys (an outstanding academy) all educated at the Harris Academy around the corner. My frustration lies in that the local tennis equivalent is tucked away in the grounds of the most academically selective school in the country, non of the kids I saw playing on Friday will be troubling the Oxbridge admissions tutors. Like Wimbledon it is where it is but when planning for the future there are som simple things one could do that significantly increase the chances of a racket ending up in the hand of the right kid!

I would like to see some experimentation taking a tournament to non traditional tennis venue. For example and I don't know how feasible it is in terms of turf, but the Olympic Stadium or perhaps the melenium stadium gives you 100m squared of turf and the potential to bring banks of seating onto the track at either end for show courts. The melenium stadium would even give you a retractable roof? The pervading atmosphere of such venues is not fading Victorians and garden fetes, they just ooze everything that is professional sport.

Doubles isn't sustainable as an independent entity, it is very entertaining to watch and definitely has its place at tournaments but is disenfranchised by he fact that the best players don't play it regularly. I would create a structure that facilitates more singles players playing doubles at tournaments for example at Grand Slams essentially splitting the tournament with 48 pairs of dedicated doubles players (reducing wild cards to a maximum of 6), with no players in the singles draw being able to enter at that point. However, the top 2 highest ranked players loosing in the first round and partners playoff to play the highest seeded 2nd round looser and partner, the winner then playing off etc... until you get to the singles Quaterfinalist looser and partner playing off for direct entry to the doubles semi-final. I am sure their would be wrinkles that would require ironing out (perhaps their should be singles points on offer for progress in the doubles and we have a world no1 ranked best tennis player over both disciplines in addition to no.1 singles and no.1 doubles. It would definitely make the schedule much less cramped early doors and bring some top names to the table. Let's face it some of the most exciting doubles tennis we see is higher ranked players playing doubles for their country in the D.C.

-- Edited by Oakland2002 on Sunday 12th of June 2016 12:24:31 PM

-- Edited by Oakland2002 on Sunday 12th of June 2016 12:26:34 PM

Indie thanks for trying.

You would normally have a 64 team draw. It remains in place for the entire top half and half the bottom half. The last quarter ie players 49 to 64 are unfilled. None of the 48 teams include players in the singles draw. The 48 team draw plays through to generate 3 out of 4 semifinal teams.

The 4 th semifinal team is generated by a series of playoffs of teams generated from the singles tournament.

The two highest ranked 1st round losers and their chosen partners play each other to get into the next playoff against the highest ranked 2nd round looser and their partner in the singles draw. The winners then go on to play the team generated from the 3rd round of the singles tournament so eventually you get a semi-finalist generated by a team that could have been created by a looser in he first, second, third, fourth or QF's of the singles draw.

It would reduce the number of doubles games that would have to be played in a congested schedule. It would allow and encourage the best players to play on in the doubles should they get knocked out of the singles early (they would have to win more playoffs to reach the semis if they are knocked out early) or indeed as late as the QF's the incentive for players ranked 8-5 (assuming the results go to form) being one win and your in the semis, your at the tournament anyway. I said the highest ranked player at each point gets to choose the player they partner with, so it could be a player who did not qualify to play in the singles draw or alternatively another player already knocked out of the singles. So for example at RG if Andy lost in the QF he could pair up with Dom or for example if Kyle knocked out in the second round but really it would make most sense to play with another loosing quarter finalist.

It would strike a decent balance as there would be 48 places for dedicated doubles teams in the draw but still allow the paying public to see the stars of singles tennis playing doubles at the business ends of tournaments and taking it seriously. I would award singles points for doubles wins in order to provider an incentive to singles players to play doubles as and when they got knocked out, thereby making the complete tennis skills set more relevant to your ranking and grow interest in the doubles format of the game.

Paire and Wawrinka (Jamie and Bruno's opponents) have been predictably replaced in the draw by Monroe/Johnson.

Edmund/Bedene win first set 6-0 over Erlich/Fleming

R1:  (WC) Jonathan Erlich (ISR) & Colin Fleming CR 102 (45+57) defeated (WC) Aljaz Bedene & Kyle Edmund CR 1284 (436+848) by 0-6 6-2 [10-6]

R1:  (1) Pierre-Hughes Herbert & Nicolas Mahut (FRA/FRA) CR 5 (3+12) defeated Dom Inglot & Daniel Nestor (CAN) CR 43 (30+13) by 3 & 3

R1:  (WC) Jonathan Erlich (ISR) & Colin Fleming CR 102 (45+57) defeated (WC) Aljaz Bedene & Kyle Edmund CR 1284 (436+848) by 0-6 6-2 [10-6]

R1:  (2) Jamie Murray & Bruno Soares (BRA) CR 10 (1+9) defeated (LL) Steve Johnson & Nicholas Monroe (USA/USA) CR 95 (44+51) by 7-6(2) 6-3

*****

QF:  (3) Jean-Julien Rojer & Horia Tecau (NED/ROU) CR 13 (7+6) vs (WC) Jonathan Erlich (ISR) & Colin Fleming CR 102 (45+57)

QF:  (Q) Chris Guccione & André Sá (AUS/BRA) vs (2) Jamie Murray & Bruno Soares (BRA) CR 10 (1+9)

QF: (WC) Jonathan Erlich (ISR) & Colin Fleming CR 102 (45+57) beat (3) Jean-Julien Rojer & Horia Tecau (NED/ROU) CR 13 (7+6) 2-6 7-6(7) [10-8]