"Scrap The National Tennis Centre"


Times tennis correspondent proposes closure will save British tennis

When the Queen opened the National Tennis Centre on Bank Lane on a drizzly day in March three years ago the mood was up beat and looking to success from the tennis players of today and tomorrow but match results have proved this untrue.

This week in The Times Neil Harman has proposed a seven step plan to "turn the sport around" - the first being "Scrap the National Tennis Centre" - he agrees with Judy Murray that the £40 million spent on the centre here in SW15 should have been spent on forty £1 million centres around the UK.

My son, aged 7, trains for free at Wimbledon as part of the LTA junior tennis initiative. If there is this scheme for local potential talent, why have a national tennis centre in Putney?

They should be all over
the country! It's not all posh Wandsworth kids who can hit a ball and be fast on their feet. So much goes on for grass roots football. The same could be initiated for tennis?

Teresa Klasener

What is the local view of the Centre? Have you been - perhaps your children have been coached there? Let us know your views email editor@putneysw15.com

April 8, 2010