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In a recent conversation with a coach from Belgium he explained to me that the current competitive structure introduced now by the LTA for mini-tennis has been a great success in Belgium over the past 6-7 years. So if a child took up tennis in Belgium aged 7 they would have had the advantage of being a part of this system for 7 years and would now be 14 years old, obviously a 9 year old would be 16 so let’s take a look at Tennis Europe’s rankings for these age groups.  Britain has 55 boys and girls with an U14 ETA ranking and 37 with an U16 ranking whereas Belgium has 26 at U14 and 20 at U16, Holland has a total of 22 players with ETA rankings at U14 and U16.  Using these statistics as to the success of the mini-tennis competitive structure in Belgium and Holland is difficult to justify. Britain has 92 players with ETA rankings which is 50% more than Belgium and 76% more than Holland so why is the new British system being based on a system which has proved to be less successful than the system we had! At every age group of` ETA rankings, at ITF U18 world rankings and on the ATP and WTA Tour GB has more players than Belgium and Holland and to look for Canada for inspiration is quite ridiculous with only 11 players on the ATP and WTA inside the top 500 and only 16 ITF world ranked players significantly less than Britain.

How can we be seriously expected to follow the lead of the LTA whose plans are based on countries that have less success than ourselves. More to the point why has the LTA decided not to try and introduce systems and coaching methodologies from countries that have produced players – this is what is more baffling. In all the reports nowhere do we see mention of the Spanish system of the Argentinean system.  If we take a look at how tennis is introduced and taught in these countries then maybe this is why we are not using these countries as models. In these countries there is no mini-tennis! They do not have 3 different kinds of balls and play on 3 different size courts they do not have tournaments for mini-tennis and they certainly do not have a competitive structure which dictates which ball you are allowed to play and on which court you are allowed to play depending on your age. This totally dictatorial approach from the LTA is quite unbelievable, to prevent players from making choices as to which competitions they would like to take part in is ridiculous, admittedly the players may be too young to make a decision as to which competition to enter but their coach and their parents are not. The fact that the decision is taken away from the very people that know and understand the players better than anyone else is farcical indeed it is a slur on the ability, knowledge and understanding of coaches throughout the country. The LTA obviously do not have the belief or confidence in coaches to leave the decision with regards the level of competition a player can compete in their hands. Instead they have decided that they know best and that they should control who can play in which events.