British Tennis Forum

Bob in Spain wrote:

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Well.  What a two months I have just had. Eight weeks of utter madness and stress that I enjoyed, but I am glad to see the back of.

Over the last 8 weeks, my colleague and I have organised 10 separate cricket events - almost exclusively in La Manga - with teams mostly from the UK but also from Germany, Ireland and Sweden. Four men's tournaments, 3 women's tournaments and 3 junior events. In total we have hosted approx 950 people during that period. Our role as event managers is basically logistics - hotels, transport, food, facility management etc. But if that workload wasn't enough, the events were littered with unexpected incidents adding to the workload

• 4 hours in A&E with a guy who dislocated his shoulder
• Searching CCTV for a guy who went missing for 12 hours after a drunken night out - later found sunbathing on the roof of the apartment block
• An academy squad missing their flight and eventually arriving 'shotgun' across 4 different flights to 2 different airports later on the same day
• 5 hours in A&E with a young girl (and her mum) who thought she had sprained her ankle but it turned out to a be a triple fracture of the tibia
• Last minute multiple rescheduling of a tournament structure due to rain - yes, we did have one weekend of rain
• Trying to solve customs issues for a group who ordered player's kit from overseas which eventually arrived two days AFTER the tournament had finished
• Driving around the region looking for Halal food as the hotel failed in its promise to provide
• Sweden turning up with their full Men's team to play in an Under 19s event despite being told many times
• Umpires dropping out at a few days notice leaving us having to find alternative umpires from the UK
• Producing approx 800 packed lunches for players and coaches
• The visit of two very famous sports stars - one expected and one unexpected

And did I mention, that in the middle of all that, I still managed 5 days in Brazil for my 'other job'.

I am physically and mentally exhausted.  It didn't help that the final event (last weekend) was a Women's Softball Cricket Festival in the Marsa Sports Club in Malta, and the person who booked our flights, booked us on the 'red-eye' twice in 4 days which meant leaving home at 3am on each occasion.  I am too old for that - almost as old as my colleague, in fact. She is still recovering.

But despite all the hard work, it has been an amazing time, with lots of fun had and lots of new friendships formed.  I am now looking forward to a quieter period as our next events are not until September.  So apart from admin chores, I am hoping to have more time to follow the tennis again.

 

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 Whew !

That sounds like an amazing few weeks, Bob. Well done for solving all the many problems you faced! And I'm sure the teams who were competing very much appreciated the events and all the effort you put in.

JonH comes home wrote:

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Wow, Im tired reading it, Bob, but well done on getting through!

And good to see you back and hope we see you around more!

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It was such a mad time, that when Leeds beat Plymouth, someone messaged to say congratulations on winning the Championship, when I had completely forgotten that Leeds were even playing.

christ wrote:

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Did the Sweden men's team win?

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Yes.  All four matches against the Spanish Under 19s.

But Spain put up a decent fight, despite having 4 players under the age of 16 in the squad - two 14 year olds.  All matches were competitive. Scores were typically 200 plays 160 or 180 plays 150 in T20 matches

We had hoped to have Norway and Portugal U19s there as well but those hopes didn't materialise.