The Weald Lawn Tennis and Squash Club recently received the much lauded Tennis Clubmark award

The Weald Lawn Tennis and Squash Club recently received the much lauded Tennis Clubmark award from Roger Draper CEO LTA , in recognition of their good practice on and off the court.

Achieving Tennis Clubmark means that Tennis Sussex and the LTA endorses and supports the club’s tennis programme, policies and procedures, action and development planning, and club management. Club Chairman, Allan Norburn  was delighted to finally receive this prestigious award.

Tennis Chairman, Phil Latham along with assistance from Martin Tigg and the Clubs coaching team combined with management committee members Adrian Rutherford, and Kate Cotter have been the prime implementers of Clubmark's recommended good practice policies.

Phil Latham commented “This has been a very worthwhile exercise looking closely at how the Club is being run and making concrete plans for the future.   It was also satisfying to find that much of what we had in place already for social and competitive tennis, and in particular for junior development, was more than satisfactory.  It was time consuming and hard work, but of great benefit to the Club.”

On the playing front,  Freya Loughton followed up on her performances at the Weald Junior Open with another great week at the Sussex County Closed. Once again Freya made the semi finals of the U18’s event and another finals appearance in the 16/u event. In the 16’s event Freya opened her account with a victory over  Isobel Standivan before removing  Tsvetomira Arsenova  the No 4 seed in the quarter finals and then No.2 seed Elise Van Heuvelen  6-4 6-0 in the semi finals. The 2^nd set of her semi final saw Freya playing virtually flawless tennis.

The final saw Freya up against Mariella Blackwell a young lady who is virtually full time on the circuit. Perhaps the deciding game was as early as the 6^th game of the 1^st set where Freya having just been broken had a 20 minuet game that saw an incredible ten deuces before Mariella hit a forehand down the line which for all her efforts Freya could not manage to run down. Having given it her all in that game it came as no surprise to see Freya broken again and then for Mariella to hold serve for the 1^st set. The 2^nd set once again had some wonderful play from both girls with a variety of spin and angles alongside heavy ground strokes before the greater match day experience of  Mariella came through for  a 6-2, 6-3 victory.  Freya commented that whilst disappointed to loose, she felt she had played as well as she could have and congratulated her opponent on her victory.

Peter Molloy made the quarter finals of the 16’s before going out in disappointing fashion to Preston’s Sam Rice whilst enjoying slightly more success in the 18’s where he made the semi finals before loosing to Josh Southern. Peter though achieving victory in the mixed doubles as he partnered Mariella Blackwell to victory over the No.1 seeds Molly Worden and Sam Kilhams for a 1^st County title. Peter played tribute to his partner, she won the match in the end because she kept returning Sam’s serve and I was struggling," he said.

Finally on the League side the Men’s 5tn team ended their summer season with a draw against Seaford.  David Lewis in potentially he last match before he goes off to study at Leeds University partnering Hector Loughton in winning both their rubbers in straight sets.