Well, in May we said good bye to the old shed and hello to summer!

Yes, summer WAS here for a while. Great that we managed to get the grass courts open early this year and to see so many members playing especially on a Saturday afternoon.

Great, too, to have had a highly successful fundraising day. Thank you to everyone who came along and to Peter, Harrison, Craig, Florian and Edie for making it all happen. There was a turn out of about sixty - a record. More than £1100 was raised for the children with special needs at Severndale Academy, which will buy quite a few tennis lessons.

If you enjoyed the sausages at the fundraiser event, then you are in luck again on Saturday 7th June. We will be firing up the BBQ and providing hot dogs rather than cake after the afternoon tennis session.

Please come along even if you are not playing tennis and have a chat and a laugh. Yes, the bar will be open.

We need an idea of how many sausages etc we need to have available so please register here if you are coming and let me know if you have any SDR's.

Duh, special dietary requests!

All the grass courts were again seeing some vibrant action on the fundraiser day. Of course, the main reason the grass courts play so well and look so good is down to one man - known to all of us simply as 'Keith'. He's done a wonderful job of nurturing and cherishing our courts and grounds over a number of years and the current success of the club - we now have a long waiting list! - is in large measure down to his diligence and hard work and love for SLTC.

Sadly, Keith's health issues have not gone away, and he has recently resigned his position as groundsman. He is pretty much irreplaceable, but we have to try and find someone ASAP. If you know of anyone who might be interested in a part time, paid, freelance role, please either let me know or ask them to get in touch with me by phone or email.

And if you are able and willing to help out in the meantime, please get in touch with Chris Marsh.

A few quick reminders on current live issues:

• Car park stickers - quite a few members have not yet collected their car park stickers. The clubhouse is not at its tidiest while we complete the refurbishment, but they are in there somewhere. Why not come to the BBQ on Saturday, play a little tennis, have a little drink, and collect your sticker at the same time?
• SLTC WhatsApp group - if you've not joined it, what's wrong with you? Doesn't everyone want random, sometimes irrelevant WhatsApp messages pinging into their inbox at midnight?  There are two sides to every story though and it's another chance to be kept informed about events and happenings at the club. And sometimes it's quicker for your your committee to get a message out to the in-crowd on WhatsApp than it is to send an email to multiple email addresses on clubspark. Follow this link on your phone to sign up: https://chat.whatsapp.com/E7RfH4dJOEiEVgOtumfyft
• Tennis balls - we are spending a fortune on tennis balls and Craig is tearing his hair out trying to make sure balls are available and appropriately recycled over several sessions. Too many seem to go missing especially during the Saturday afternoon social session, which finishes at 4pm. We need to be a little more disciplined in our approach please.
  • Members - collect four balls and place at the base of the net during each changeover
  • Organizers - replace the balls in the tins at the end of the session; leave tins in the club house
  • Members - if playing on after a club session, please swap and use your own tennis balls

Before I forget, I promised new club member Luke Henley (btw a top level tennis player) a plug for his racquet stringing and repair service. Full details are available on his website https://henleyrackets.com/  but in a nutshell - drop your racquet into his special wooden box at the side of the clubhouse (it's quite safe), go to the booking page on his website, tell him what you want, get your racquet back a couple of days later, and start winning some more games!

It's fast, efficient and reasonably priced.

And finally! Yes, finally. Yes it's a bit long this one isn't it? Well done for getting this far but DO NOT STOP READING!

That is if you want to know about the forthcoming Club Championships.

Actually I am boring myself now. I need a drink. A cup of tea, since you ask. I know where you were going with that question...

I will send a separate email in a day or two when you are fresh and ready to read all about - and more importantly enter - the 2025 Club Championships which will be beyond mega this year!

Woohoo. So much to look forward to!

Enjoy your tennis,

Jeremy