We hope that all of you and your families have stayed healthy through the pandemic and that you continue to stay safe. Now things are at least partly up and running again at the Tennis Club we thought it was time to produce a Newsletter and bring you up to date on the current situation at the Club.     

Some members have been asking questions about the bubble and what we are doing, whilst others have enquired about refunds / compensation for not being able to play for an extended period of time. Whilst we do not have definitive answers at present, we do hope we can put your minds at ease in respect of our intentions. 

CURRENT SITUATION 

COURTS AND BOOKING:

As you should all be aware now courts 1, 2, 3 and 4 at the Club are open and available to members for both singles and doubles play. We are not doing block booking of courts for specific groups at present and ask you to continue booking courts individually until we receive further guidance from the LTA. The booking system has worked well so far although we understand some people have struggled with it and Club Spark has not been perfect. 

CLUB HOUSE REMAINS CLOSED:

For the time being we do intend to keep the Club House closed and we apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. We do hope you will appreciate the enormous amount of work that will be required if we open the Club House whilst current social distancing requirements are in place. 

BUBBLE REMAINS CLOSED:

The Bubble is also closed for the time being and we have no idea when this facility will be available again. Hopefully we may be able to open in time for Autumn block bookings but again we await guidance from the LTA. 

NO GROUP COACHING:

There is also no group coaching taking place at LFE at present. Although individual coaching is available. 

LEAGUE TENNIS:

As far as League Tennis is concerned, it doesn’t look too promising for the main Leicestershire Summer Leagues, although nothing official has been received so far. It is possible there will be some revised league structures but this depends on being able to have gatherings of twelve people and of course the use of club houses across the county! We will advise when any further news arrives regarding league tennis. 

GUIDELINES:

To all members we remind you to take full notice of the guidelines we have sent out and which are available on the LTA website. Please do social distance whilst at the Club and please do not visit the Club if you believe you had Covid-19 symptoms or you are feeling unwell.  

HOW THE CLUB HAS BEEN AFFECTED BY THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC  

FINANCIAL IMPACT:

The complete closure of our facilities (which was fifty days) and the continued closure of the Bubble and the Club House has and will continue to have a large financial impact on the Club which is impossible to quantify at the moment. However, we have now received some grants which hopefully will mean the Club not suffering any serious adverse impact. 

MEMBERSHIP

One of the consequences of the lockdown was the cancellation of our Open Day in April - that along with the cancellation of Wimbledon and the interest which it generates will have a negative effect on membership numbers. However, we are now getting some new members in to the Club and we are currently offering adult membership for £99 for the remainder of the Calendar Year. So if you know somebody who is interested in joining then please get them to contact Andy Edwards on 07833 465369 or at edwardos@mac.com, the only stipulation is that they were not a club member in 2019. 

A warm welcome to our new members:

• Andy Wroot
• Pam Goddard
• Will Goddard
• Ben Goddard
• Martin White
• Steve Nicol
• Guy Rollins
• Rose Gander
• Peter Clifford
• Martin Bailey

COMPENSATION FOR CLOSURE

We would like to reassure those members who had paid annual subscriptions before lockdown occurred that we will look at the question of compensation in respect of the unavailability of our facilities, although of course through no fault of the Club. We will put some proposals forward to members prior to the AGM.   

BUBBLE PROJECT

One of the decisions taken by the Committee following lockdown was to postpone our application for Planning Permission for the three court bubble. The rationale for this being not so much our own finances but the uncertainty as to where potential lenders to the Club will be financially once lockdown is completed. There have been reports that the LTA will have money to lend Clubs for projects but there has to be some doubts. For this reason the majority of our Committee felt it was in the Clubs interests to postpone the Planning Application until ‘post lockdown’. 

We understand there will be concern from some members regarding the Bubble Project but we would like to reassure you that the project has not been cancelled. We intend to set up a small sub-committee, we will talk to potential lenders at the earliest opportunity and look at various options for raising funds. 

Our firm intention remains to have a new Bubble. 

CLUB WORKLOAD

COMMITTEE / OFFICER VACANCIES

There remains a considerable workload at the Club, even though we were closed for almost two months. At present we have a Committee of eight, including the Club Coach, an extremely small number - we really do need more members to help run the Club on an efficient basis. There are currently six key roles at the Club which are vacant, all very important to the smooth running of the Club. It is inconceivable that a Club like LFE has not had a Secretary for over eighteen months! 

We ask each of you to consider whether you can help in any capacity, including sharing a role if that is what suits you. We have listed below the offices we need to fill, for more information you can contact John Noon on 01162831855 or 07704373757 or at jsnoon@virginmedia.com. Please do give this some consideration, it’s your Club, it will be as good or otherwise as you the members make it! 

For some of the positions below we could accept someone not sitting on the Committee, for example, the Ladies Captain does not attend Committee Meetings but does submit reports. The vacancies are as follows – 

Secretary – This post has been vacant now for eighteen months and a Club cannot function effectively without a Secretary. It is a position which probably requires two to three hours a week of someone’s time, dealing with enquiries, being a Main Contact with the LTA and Tennis Leicestershire, organising and minuting meetings (we have probably eight Committee meetings and one AGM per annum), registering the Club with the LTA and ensuring entries are made for Leicestershire and regional leagues. 

Bubble Manager – This post has recently become available due to Nick Cvetkovic’s resignation. Nick took over when we decided to move all bubble bookings to Club Spark and he did an excellent job in building up the number of both regular and occasional users. We clearly want to build upon this good work once we can re-open the Bubble. With daily bookings being processed through Club Spark the main role of the Bubble Manager is to administer Block Bookings, liaise with the Coaches regarding their usage and keep a general eye on the facility in terms of its condition and deal with any misuse which is reported. 

Tournament Secretary – This position has been vacant for some time now and we know from experience it is not an easy job to arrange internal tournaments / competitions at the Club. Whilst it would be wonderful to have Club tournaments taking place regularly, we understand this is probably not going to happen. But we would like to have somebody or a small group, maybe two or three members, who could organise and administer our annual Club Championships. We would also invite anybody who wishes to run internal singles or doubles leagues (or ladders) to step forward (again it could be more than one individual organising). Helping to run these competitions doesn’t mean you have to be on the Committee, it’s not essential but we do need help and new ideas if we are to run competitions at the Club.

Fixture Secretary – This is an important job at any Tennis Club. The schedule of fixtures will be provided by the League Secretary which will outline which clubs our teams will play and the week that the fixture is expected to be played. It is then the job of each Club to arrange the specific dates and times for each fixture. This requires a Fixture Secretary to liaise with team captains at our Club and with the Fixture Secretaries of other Clubs to ensure all matches are covered, with no double bookings of courts. It is an important job which requires a fair bit of time during March and early April in particular. If nobody does this job it goes without saying that we won’t be able to enter Leagues and play competitive tennis. It is a job which could be split, somebody organising Men’s and somebody doing Ladies fixtures, although there would need to be some liaison or indeed it could be split so somebody looks after Regular League matches (which are played Monday to Friday) and somebody could look after Vets matches (which are generally played at weekends). At present Lynn Norwood is arranging the dates and John Noon puts the home fixtures on Club Spark and deals with most rearranged fixtures. Lynn is Ladies Captain and John is Chairman – neither requires a second or in John’s case a third job! 

Men’s Captain – We do currently have Men’s Captain, it is Steve Stroud, the role is to co-ordinate the Men’s teams, to try and ensure that the right players play in the right teams and to arrange practice sessions prior to the season commencing and where applicable at other times. Steve has been Men’s Captain for a few years now and combines this with being a member of the Tennis Leicestershire Board as ‘Competitions Manager’. Ideally Steve would like to find a replacement as Men’s Captain before the AGM in November 2020. 

Membership Secretary – We have not had a specific Membership Secretary at the Club or at least not in the past twenty years! Membership was combined with the Secretary position and then became part of the Treasurer’s role, but ideally this should be separated from the Treasurer’s role. We would welcome somebody coming forward and offering to fulfil this role of administering and Managing Club membership.   

JOBS THAT NEED DOING AT THE CLUB:

On a similar theme, there are a many jobs which need undertaking at the Club, some occasionally and some regularly. For some it is necessary to get outside help and pay for services, however the majority are tasks which can be undertaken on a voluntary basis by members. You will see some Committee members down at the Club fixing something or other and from time to time there are a few non-Committee members who help us out, but those who do so are relatively few in number! 

We need more of you to assist in getting relatively straightforward jobs done. For example, you should not have to be a Committee member to re-sand the courts, clean the windows, pick up litter or empty the bins in the Club House! There is a list below, please have a read through it, yes all those things need doing, can you please give us some help? Again, it is ‘your Club’, the more of you that help the more we get done and our Club should be much better for it. If you can help then please do, you can contact Tony Onions for any advise you may need or to register your willingness to assist, Tony can be contacted on 07976735284 or at antony.onions1@ntlworld.com 

TENNIS CLUB MAINTENANCE LIST MAY 2020:

As you will see, there is plenty to do. The old adage ‘more hands make light work’ is as true now as it ever was! Please do try and help us, in whichever way you can, any help will be appreciated. Without more help we will struggle as a Club!

Hopefully by the next time we send out a Newsletter we will have more facilities open, greater numbers playing and jobs at the Club being completed by greater numbers too. Please stay safe and enjoy your tennis and your Tennis Club.

Regards

The Committee – June 2020