Latest News

The Final Andrewartha Mixed Doubles Competition will take place on Sunday 3rd Aug and will start at 10:00 am. B-B-Q food will be available at a price of £6 after the competition. Please put your name on the list provided on the Club Notice Board, stating whether you want food or not.

Joining The Avenue Tennis Club

WIMBLEDON SPECIAL OFFER

BURNHAM OPEN - JUNIOR AND SENIOR COMPETITION FORMS AVAILABLE THROUGH LINK

Summer Term Break Sports Camp for Kids - July 24th-25th and July28th-Aug1st

If you are wondering how to keep your kids entertained and active during the forthcoming summer term break, then send them along to the Avenue Summer Sports Camp. This will run 9am to 3pm and is priced at £75 for over 8's or £50 for under 8's (a daily rate is available for those who cant make all 7 days). Children will enjoy a range of instructed activities and will participate in crazy golf, table tennis and pool as well as tennis. Please contact our Head Coach, Vinny Duddy, to book your children in now (01278 782758 avenuetennisheadcoach@live.co.uk).

FREE OPEN DAY

For the second year running we staged a fantastic New Year's Eve party at the Avenue and 91 people saw in 2007 to a bagpipe version of Auld Lang Syne. To see some of the pictures click here.

Nathalie and Peter are Burnham Open Champions 2006

Congratulations to Nathalie Ayton and Peter Wilcox for winning the main singles events at the 88th Burnham Open. Nathalie also won the Somerset Singles Ladies competition and Peter also won the Mens' Doubles competition with his partner Ed Stenner.

There were many Avenue players in finals again this year and a number of them went on to become champions: Emily Rossiter (Handicap Ladies' Singles), Malcolm Carpenter and Vinny Duddy (Handicap Mens' Doubles), Kerry Matthews and James Tuckett (Handicap Mixed Doubles), Kerry Matthews again with her mum Linda (Handicap Ladies' Doubles)

Dave Vennall and Nathan Edwards receive the Andrewartha trophy from Paul Andrewartha

Adult Coaching for 2006

James Tuckett is starting a Ladies morning for Mondays with coaching 10-11 and matchplay 11-12. If you wish to take part, please contact James 01278 782758 jtuckett2003@yahoo.co.uk . In addition Barry Ramsden continues to offer beginners' coaching on Friday nights 6.30-8pm and Vinny Duddy is running the improvers' courses on Thursday nights 7-9pm. Price for all courses £4 for members and £6 non members.

First Social Mixed Doubles Of The Season A Great Success

The weather was perfect for the first Sunday social event of the season on April 9th with 19 members taking part. Nathan Edwards was the winner followed closely by Pat Hunter. The next event is on Sunday May 14th at 11am. This will be held in memory of Ron Hines and we will play for the Ron Hines trophy. Click here to see action shots from the April event.

We are delighted to announce that The Wheatley Clinic based at College Street in Burnham have recently agreed to sponsor the club. They provide a wide range of complimentary therapies and products and would be delighted to offer their services to members and their friends/family for sports injuries or general ailments. We are also sponsored by Highbridge Caravan and Camping Centre, one of the largest retailers of outdoor leisure equipment and vehicles in the UK and we are grateful for their support. Companies wishing to sponsor the club and receive prominent advertising display boards on the courts should contact James Tuckett 01278 782758 jtuckett2003@yahoo.co.uk

The Avenue New Year's Eve Party

Our New Year's Eve bash was a great success with 60 people joining in the fun. A mass of balloons were released on the stroke of midnight (click picture) before a splendidly drunken rendition of Auld Langs Syne. To top that off, everyone then joined in The Conga before returning to the bar for refuelling. Many thanks to Kevin Lees for keeping the entertainment going right up until the 2 am finish, and also to Liz Bailey for putting on a splendid buffet. Finally thanks to Carole Smith, Clive Haines and Kay Rossiter for decorating the room and setting up the balloons.

We wish all of our members a great New Year and hope that many of you will be able to join in next time when we look forward to seeing in 2007.

Head coach, James Tuckett is looking to organise a tennis holiday for club members in May/June to sunny Spain. Click here for details as James would like to get feedback to plan numbers asap. (Webmaster Jan06)

Vinny Duddy and Emily Rossiter made a formidable partnership in winning the Blanchworth Trophy at the Gloucestershire tournament on Saturday September 3rd.

For the second year running we took a contingent of 8 Avenue players to participate in this charity mixed doubles event. Vinny and Emily's achievement is all the more impressive as over 150 people took part in the event from all over the UK and further afield at 18 venues across the county. Malcolm Carpenter and Charlotte Gadd also did very well in the main tournament narrowly losing out in the Quarter Finals. Meanwhile, in the plate competition, Darren Lloyd and Carole Smith reached the Semi- Finals.

Blanchworth is a fantastic event that we can recommend to other members to put in their diaries for next year because, as well as participating in an enjoyable tournament for charitable causes, you get the opportunity to play tennis in the gardens of some of the most fantastic Cotswold country homes. This large scale event has been running for over 20 years and is brilliantly organised by Sally Roberts who lays on superb catering and hosts the finals, prize giving and raffles at her lovely home near Dursley. Click the photo above for more images of the day.

Avenue Success At The Burnham Open Tournament (click the photo for more images)

The 87^th annual Burnham Open Tennis Championships came to a climax on Sunday August 21st with a number of our own members winning events against competitors from around the country.

Avenue’s star performer was Emily Rossiter (picture left) who reached 3 finals and won them all! In the Mixed Doubles Handicap she partnered Craig Phillips to victory in a tough 3 setter against defending champions Kevin Fleck and Jaqui Warrender. Emily also won the Ladies’ Doubles Handicap event with Charlotte Gadd after winning the Ladies’ Singles event, again facing Jaqui Warrender.

Martin Hoyland (picture above) did The Avenue proud by reigning supreme in the Men's events. He beat Ben Fletcher 6-3, 6-1 to retain the main Open Men’s Singles trophy and also beat James Deem 6-2, 6-2 to win the Somerset Closed Singles. A fine week for The Avenue was capped off with Darren Lloyd and Parag Singhal winning a two hour Doubles Handicap match 7-5, 9-7 against Kevin Fleck and Tim Hewson from Exeter.

The Avenue's Jenny Kirk and Pat Hunter narrowly lost a close Ladies Doubles Veterans' final against Viv Barber (also Avenue) and Marilyn Small 2-6, 6-4, 6-4 and Bruce Gordon (Avenue) partnered Phillipa Deem in the Mixed Veterans' competition losing in the final to Ros Coleman-Cooke (who also won the ladies handicap singles) and Phil Ingram. Once again Taunton's Natalie Ayton ruled supreme among the ladies winning the Ladies Singles (against Elizabeth Thorpe) and the Mixed Doubles competition (with Shaun Carroll) as well as beating Elizabeth Thorpe again in the Ladies Somerset Closed event.

Entries were up over 10% on 2004 and thanks go to Linda Matthews for the professional organisation of the senior tournament and to Peter Herke for again doing a splendid job as referee. The catering was first rate and Liz Bailey and her family of helpers are to be congratulated for keeping us all well fed for the two weeks of the Open. We also had many of our own members assist with manning the bar and Clive Haines did an excellent job of ensuring this was well organised and that we were stocked up to meet the refreshment needs of the players and spectators.

Sunday August 7th 2005 saw the return of the long running Andrewartha tournament. Paul Andrewartha and his family made the long trip to the club to see the tournament and present the prizes of this event held in honour of former club captain John Andrewartha. Click here on on the image below for pictures from the day.

We recently held the qualifying competitions for the Save the Children National tennis tournament. In glorious sunshine hundreds of pounds were raised for the Save the Children Fund. There were prizes for the winners kindly provided by the tournament sponsors Tony Price Sports, who also brought a range of rackets to try out on the day. The winners of this tournament go forward to a regional final in the autumn, and if they win this round they then go forward to play on the hallowed grass of Wimbledon. The winning girls doubles team were Victoria Clark and Hayley Butland from Taunton. The winning boys were Tom Stevens from Mark and Cameron Reilly from Bridgwater. Malcolm Carpenter and Viv Barber beat Vinny Duddy and Debbie Smith to secure their place in the senior regional finals. Good luck to them all.

Click images below for larger pictures

A private section of the website has now been set up in which committee meeting minutes and other non-public club matters will be published. If you would like to access these pages, then email Darren Lloyd who will make them available to you provided that you are a club member.

As soon as children and adults began to turn up and play, the weather turned for the better and we had a great afternoon in the sunshine. Well done to James Tuckett for promoting and organising another successful event and thanks go to all the coaching staff for making the games and coaching fun for young and old alike. Six new junior members signed up on the spot and a number of the adults expressed an interest in starting up on one of our coaching courses - all of which helps to contribute to developing the club and bring new players into the social circles at The Avenue. A local press photographer was on hand to record the day so keep a look out in the local papers!

Two of our juniors Tom Stevens and Cameron Reilly were both winners at the Dorchester Open Tournament during the Easter break . Cameron was the winner of the under 12's singles and together they won the under 12's double. Click the picture for a larger image.

For more details on all future events, please check out the Diary of Events section.

If you have news for this section, please contact Darren Lloyd 01278 792220 darrenlloyd@hotmail.co.uk

Thursday August 07, 2008