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LTA  Summer  County  Cup  2008

 

Local Interest in the LTA County Cup

Lucy, my daughter, returned home yesterday evening having played 15 tennis matches in five days.  She had been a member of the ladies’ team representing Devon in the LTA Summer County Cup.  These were not club matches.  Lucy, who lives in a turning off Pinhoe Road on the Heavitree side, was mixing it with the best in the land, some of whom were world ranked.  Needless to say, I’m very proud to be her father.

The 42 competing UK tennis counties are split into seven groups of six for the County Cup.  Devon ladies were in Group 3 which played at West Worthing.  Six players are selected each day to form a team of three pairs.  Each county plays the other five in turn over Monday to Friday of the competition week.

Devon beat Yorkshire 6-3, Oxfordshire 9-0, Dorset 5-4, Berkshire 5-4, and narrowly lost to Kent on the last day 4-5.  At the end of the week, the top two counties are promoted and the bottom two demoted.  As our ladies were runners up in the group, they have been promoted to Group 2 for the 2009 County Cup.  Bravo!

Devon’s men were also in their Group 3 which played five different counties at Hunstanton.  They didn’t fare so well, beating only Nottinghamshire, so will be in Group 4 for next year’s competition.

The County Cup is very much a team effort.  Lucy’s ability to win matches with her partners at this level, bearing in mind her (unspecified!) advanced age, is remarkable, especially so as she has never sustained any sort of tennis injury throughout her playing career.  It is all down to her natural talent, highly competitive spirit, and brilliant coaching.

Lucy learnt all her tennis at the Summerway Junior Lawn Tennis Club, further down Pinhoe Road, coached by John Harley.  John has given over 25 years of voluntary service to the club, where all members received superb group coaching free of charge.

Jim Harle.

 

The news item below was written on 26th July for inclusion in the August edition of the Heavitree News.  It didn’t make it, as the focus for the month was on the Heavitree Arch, being another example of the City Council’s intransigence and disregard for citizens and the community.

Sadly, we live in a City governed by an elitist Council.  By depriving City youngsters of affordable tennis coaching, the opportunity to excel at the game no longer exists in Exeter unless the family has money.  Families of modest means pay their Council Tax the same as everyone else, but suffer discrimination in the scope for their children to play tennis to a high level, due to Council prejudice against Summerway.