Tennis vs Golf: Producing World Class Talent in the UK (and Ireland!!)

It's the time of year where I have to listen to my mother rant and rave about the terrible state of British tennis and how the LTA should be ashamed of itself for the lack of genuine talent produced in the UK with all the money they have. Andy Murray (who didn't actually come through the LTA) is the only player in the mens top 100 and I believe there are 2 ladies in the ladies top 100.

By stark contrast the top 2 in the world of golf are English, McDowell and Mcilroy are both in the top ten and (without being too pedantic about birthplace, for all you 'Justin Rose isn't English' haters) there are currently 13 UK & I players in the world's top 100.

I'm very curious why golf seems to have such relative success in producing genuine talent. Admittedly we're in the middle of a pretty golden period but it doesn't really explain the huge difference. The LTA often use the excuse of tennis being too costly and middle class but these criticisms could easily be levelled at golf. I know that the US college system often adds the final touches to UK&I golfers but this same college system is available to UK&I tennis players too but none seem to pop out the other end as world class performers.

I was pretty shocked to discover that the top british tennis pros are subsidised to the tune of around 18k per year by the LTA, they also often receive a wild card to wimbledon where 1st round losers receive 15k! that's a total of 32k without winning a match. Golf doesn't seem to have this comfort blanket for underacheivment at the professional level and I wonder if this is the key factor. There must be hundreds of aspiring young golf pros playing on the Jamega Tour and Europro Tour that would snatch your hand off for 15k a year and a starting spot at the Open but they don't get it without earning it and therein seems to lie the difference.

This may have been better posted on the tennis board but i've had a look and it can get pretty brutal over there so I'll let the golfers have their say first....

I don't think golf is particularly middle class in the UK, certainly not in many areas of Scotland and NI. In fact it is pretty inclusive and also extremely popular. Tennis is none of these things... perhaps this is where the problem stems from.

sejorge,
Living in the United States I can assure you that, barring two sisters and a smatterring of male pros the sports media is asking the same sort of thing.
The US College system very seldom produces successful pros and perhaps the reason for that (tennis stars tend to be younger) offers a hint as to why neither country has much luck in producing more than the very occasional top player.
There's so much else for young athletes to do, so many other sports to try.
Unless a child specialises in tennis from a ridiculously early age, it's unlikely they'll be successful, whereas very few pro golfers start specialising in golf in their pre-teen years; McIlroy and Woods perhaps, Mickelson, but just as many are more like Els and Faldo and countless others and move to golf after trying other sports.
I'm speculating that is less true in the current hotbeds of the sport, say Serbia, Russia or Spain where there may be fewer other sports organizations to compete with their tennis structure. Just a guess.
Remember, Australia and, later Sweden were once powerhouses of tennis, but the sport is currently passing them by, the odd Sod excepted.

I think that a big part of the reason is to do with the facilities available for golf and tennis. I get the impression that to play tennis the options are an expensive private health and fitness centre full up of people that don't mind a game of tennis but are generally there for the gym/sauna/pool/young mums - the alternative to this is a council tennis court where the net is ripped, the concrete (?!) is bobbly and you have to sling cheap booze drinking teenagers out before getting a game. Contrast this to golf where as a teenager you can join a good private club for a £100 or so a year, play great courses for very little (I played RSG for £10 as a junior) and when you are a member the club is full of golfers that a young player can learn from.

Another issue might be that to become a professional tennis player you have to prioritise it from such a young age that if you do not make it then you are left with little qualifications and little prospects outside of the game. With golf, most pro's are able to study to degree level without it affecting their prospects in the game so they will at least have something to fall back on.

Despite all of this, if Rory wins the next two majors and Murray wins Wimbledon then interestingly it will be Murray that will probably win sports personality of the year. I know that this is no great accolade to judge sporting achievements but it will show the misguidedness of our media.

I think it's a myth that Tennis is expensive, certainly in Scotland as most towns have stand alone Tennis clubs, you could easily join, and would be heartily welcomed and encouraged to join a club even as an adult for around £100-£200 a year for a club with good facilities/courts. A child membership would be considerably lower.

If Murray was to win wimbledon and win SPOTY as a result, I don't think many could argue, It's been over 80 years since Britain had a player anything like the calibre of Murray, and given that it's been over 80 years since anyone from this country won a grand slam it would probably be seen as a bigger achievement in a global sporting sense, as we as a country have had many many major winners in golf over that time.
Simply because we as members of this forum like golf, probably more than tennis is no reason why McIlroy should win SPOTY ahead of Murray should he win Wimbledon (or any other GS)
However if McIlroy were to win the next two, I think there would be no argument that he deserved the prize, but I would think that to be extremely unlikely occurance. He's only won three tournaments in his career, a further two this year, and majors at that would be a very big ask.

Super, thats really interesting about tennis clubs near you. Where I live, there is a tennis club 2 mins away and then maybe 4-5 £120+ per month health clubs with tennis facilities. Contrast this to 5 pay and play golf courses and 6 private clubs within a ten minute drive and the scenario is very different.

I suppose that weather may also play a part. Golf is a year round sport for many with driving ranges and wet weather gear making it possible to play in even the worst weather. I'm guessing that most tennis clubs only have outdoor facilities and wet tennis balls and playing in waterproof gear is no way to improve.

Isn't the important thing starting playing in the first place? That's where tennis has the big advantage, the nasty local courts covered in syringes might be horrible but for a young kid just starting to play the sport they're as good as anything. And if they start enjoying the game and want to take it more seriously, then they move to the tennis clubs. I think it's a lot harder for kids to get into golf unless their family introduce them to it.

I suppose that a difference now is that there are a hell of a lot more families that are introducing their kids to golf so pure numbers must make golf more likely to be successful.

I think that the standard of coaching has also made a big difference over the past 10-20 years as I think that golf coaching has improved immensely whereas I get the impression that tennis coaching has not kept up. Golf coaches used to mainly consist of people that have failed on the smaller golf tours, which is the impression that I get with tennis coaching. However, golf coaches are now choosing golf coaching as a career above playing and the standard seems so much better. I've never had tennis coaching so may be well off the mark but the tennis coach at my local health club seems to be of the "chasing mums" variety, much like golf pro's used to be.

I think things are a bit differenet up here Harrison, traiditonally most towns have a tennis club not connected to spa or health clubs and many have golf clubs, given that populations are lower there is always a demand for members, hence lower prices.
I'm a member of two golf clubs, one an Open qualifier, which costs about £600 a year, would easily be £2k down south and the other is St.Andrews which costs me a mere £360 a year (fair enough it's subsidised by the sheer number of visitors), plus £140 for my club giving me access to the Old, New, Jubilee, Eden, Castle, and Strathtyrum courses, plus Kingsbarns for £25. Therefore neither golf or tennis are elitist or exclusive up here, it could very well be that you are drawn with someone unemployed and a company director.

It does however beg the question, if our golf facilities are so good, numerous and cheap, why do we have so few golfers from Scotland breaking into the ranks. The winter weather probably has something to do with it, but then it's not exactly much warmer or conjusive for golf during the winter months in Sweden, England, NI or Germany and they are producing the players.

One thing that always crops up in my discussions with the aforementioned mother is that it's probably easier to identify a really talented golfer than a really talented tennis player. If someone shoots 63 when they're 15 or 16, nobody actually needs to see it happen for important people within the game to take notice. I suspect the one-on-one nature of tennis means that someone with knowledge and experience and access to the right people needs to see a really good youngster play against someone else really talented to form a proper judgement. Golf benefits from good (or great) scores produced by anyone being directly comparible to the very best players in the world.

Super, those prices are ridiculous?!? Certainly seems a hell of a lot fairer than down here where those prices might get you a couple of weeks rent of a room?!?

The current lack of talent in Scottish golf is very mystifying but then it feels like these things are very cyclical. After Faldo, we didn't have too much to be proud of on the golfing front but then the last couple of years has seen everybody step up. Martin Laird seems to have all the right qualities, although he seems to get very little press compared with other British players that have achieved similar or even less.

Harrison, the prices are very similar in Carnoustie and on the West coast too.
Of course there are still courses where it is quite expensive to join and you may have to wait, but we're spoilt for choice up here. In a 50 mile radius I've probably got a hundred courses to choose from.

I'm personally happy to see anyone from these septic isles do well, I'm not one of those bitter, chippy Scots who feels the need to wave a flag and demean all things English. It's great to see the Norn's, Westwood, Donald, Poults, Casey etc doing well.

It is bafffling, English golf is on something of a high so possibly a bad time to judge but tennis in the UK is shocking really considering teh funds and facilities you would have expected to have fluked a few more players.
I dont think either sport is inclusive or welcoming personally despite what has been said on here so I wouldnt sat hat was the reason.

Strangest thing about the lack of young Scottish pros is that they keep doing well at the amateur level. Not sure what it is that means none of their amateurs are making the step up... perhaps the SGU needs to look at the support it gives ti its top amateurs when they turn pro.

I wonder if it is a coincidence that with Scotland having tennis facilities which are cheaper and easier to gain access to that they have a statistically higher number of players than they ought to amongst Britains "best" (if that isn't an oxymoron)
Not sure why that doesn't follow on with golf though.

Spot on Ned

I think that the money available to young golf amateurs/pros in Scotland is much less than the rest of Europe.
Pro rata countries such as Finland and Portugal invest more per player than Scotland.
I also think that because we have so many good young players that many slip under the radar.

Scotland is generally very poor at joined up thinking in areas such as football, golf and local politics.
The group of six home based young Pros that have recieved a sponsorship deal recently is a good move forward but bottom line it is only about £30k each a year.

As regards Tennis, the fact that Mrs Murray took her son out of the LTA system speaks volumes.
The LTA always remind me of the old Golf Foundation. a group of well to do do gooders who have not got a clue on how to spend the dosh that they raise.

s_r I love the way you claim not to be bitter in the same sentence as 'these septic isles'.

As far as why tennis is so relatively poor here, I was listening to this very debate on the radio the other day and the tennis chap seemed to think they needed to get more kids interested - in being ball boys and girls

Ive just moved house and we now live next to a park which has 4 courts which I think are cheap to use and yet they are always empty. Im on the south coast so the weather is good a lot of the time so no excuses there.
Next to the tennis courts are basketball courts and a mini 5 a side football court...there are always kids playing in them. There is also a new skate park in the town center and its totally always packed.
So maybe the simple facts are that the vast majority of kids think tennis and probably golf are just dull sports liked by older people. Most tennis and golf clubs arent that interested in involving kids from local communities to use their facilities to find out if they would actually like the sports if they had some proper coaching so to be honest I cant see that many kids coming through in the future in golf or tennis unless their parents are members of clubs themselves.

To me, tennis seems to be a very upper class sport, I played golf from a young age, and in the whole of our school there were probably 20 - 30 kids who played golf, and 2 who played tennis (by that not just in P.E).

Now that was despite there being 5 tennis courts and absolutely no recognition of golf at our school whatsoever, why is that?

Well I think it is down to a perception of the game, or maybe a lack of enjoyment, I really am not so sure.

Now, I have involvement in my old school through golf, and the amount of kids who play golf (members of clubs) has probably doubled but tennis, STILL about 2 kids play.

So surely it has got to be down to numbers who play - I think I recall, whilst watching Andy Murray on Monday, that the guy he was playing (from Spain) was ranked number 56 in the world and number 15 in SPain - surely that tells you something?

As for British players, sometimes we just have to accept we aren't that good!

JD, I think that's true in general that we aren't very good at sport, or at least not as good as we think we are. How many truly world class sportsmen do we have in ANY sports? Hardly any.
We seem to think we have a right to be good at sport without putting in the work, funding, training facilities and coaching.

Tennis and to a lesser extent golf are very individual sports where kids may enjoy more team or group sports.
Almost all of the kids playing tennis at my club have a parent sat delivering/watching/waiting for them Its not a thing they can just pitch up on their own and play.I think if someone takes to golf at an early age they can continue to practise and improve much more easily.

We certainly dont produce many world class tennis players though we do have currently one of the best male players in the world. And at the moment we do have a lot of world class golfers.
Id also say we produce a lot of world class sportsmen in other sports. The UK is not a big country and it spreads itself thin in relation to the team sports it plays. If you look at the performances in the last two Olympics the UK is actually performing very well.
Im sure this will provoke the usual responses about joke Olympic events but actually there are very very few sports in the world played by the entire world so to a greater or lesser degree most sports are minority sports.

For a country where sport is near to the centre of our society or at least a very large element of the public consciousness I think we actually punch way below our weight. Perhaps because we spread ourselves too thinly as you say Diggers, for example Norway tend to concentrate on sports at which they are likely to succeed, e.g. winter sports, whereas losers like Chemmy Alcott are in there for no other purpose than to make up the numbers.
I'd like to see the UK take a more proactive stance and fund sports only where there is a reasonable chance of success.

The main investment in sport at grass roots level shouldnt be about winning, to me that is a very sad measure indeed of sporting success for kids.
Investment should primariliy be about enabling people to experience and enjoy sports....lots of sports...and therefore hopefully enriching their lives. If as a by product of this lots of winners are produced then thats great but sport shouldnt be about just winning and losing, for the vast majority of people it is actually the taking part that counts.

I agree about funding at grass roots level Diggers, but I don't believe in funding a bunch of deadbeats who have no chance of competing in a sport where they have zero chance of success, i.e Skiing.

I like the way that Australia does it in that they look at kids and see what sports they are best suited for and then coach them in the appropriate discipline, of course if the kids doesn't enjoy it they won't force it upon them.

I think that people maybe forgetting our rugby and cricket teams that are well up there with the best in the world. England's cricket have the chance to become a proper world number 1 team if they beat India this summer and our rugby team goes into this autumn's world cup with a runner's up and winners record behind them.

I think that dynamark makes a very interesting point with regards to golf and tennis being very individual sports and as such this makes it easier for parents to encourage team sports where they know that their kids are safe amongst other kids. For young children especially, a parent would need to supervise them which is a big time commitment whereas sports like football and rugby will either take a couple of hours at the most or may even afford parents the opportunity to drop their kids off and use that time elsewhere.

This also relates to a few things that I have read about China and golf recently. China have always been very successful at individual sports due, in part, to their one child policy. However, the Chinese government will only fund sports that are competed for in the Olympics which is why they are good at table tennis, badmington etc etc. This is also part of the reason why this years ladies French Open tennis was the first major won by a Chinese tennis player ever and success in tennis expected to just grow and grow. The announcement of golf as an Olympic sport has thus stimulated vast investment into the sport and with the resources and individualistic mentality in China, this has the potential to create a new dominant country in the game.

Diggers. You sound like David Cameron.Quite correct though.
As a parent I was tempted to think I may be able to help my lass to be a very high standard at badminton.But she enjoys other sports as well and we are happy with that .At high school they cover just about every sport throughout the year but what is also important is that there are the after school opportunities and teams and contacts with outside agencies to help those who wish to progress in a particular sport.vast majority of PE staff love what they do and are very dedicated

I think most sports that gain funding are set targets that have to be achieved to recieve any funding. Alcott who you are being very hard on by the way, has had hers cut I believe and she is mostly privately funded. She was a top 30 skier and has been unlucky with injury so to me that doesnt make her a no hoper. But Im sure there are other skiers not as talented as her who have benefited when possibly they shouldnt have.
Not sure about the Aussie route, sounds a bit too focussed on producing winners, who cares what you might be best suited to if you enjoy something else. Its effectively streaming and its fine to say that the kids wont get pressurised into carrying on if they dont like it however if they turn out to be good at it I suspect there will actually be plenty of pressure from coaches, teachers and parents for them to carry on.

Harrison, Rugby and Cricket are only played well by a handful of countries so it isn't very difficult for England to be half decent at.

I'm delighted that Alcotts funding has been cut, shes in a sport in which she has zero chance of success, because her competitors have been skiing since they could walk and live in the right area to become better than someone who grew up in a country with an average of 6 inches of snow a year.
It's like someone from Timbuktoo trying to be a world class Morris dancer, it just isn't going to happen. So why bother funding someone just to be in the top 30. It's a waste of money and just funding a lifestyle, rather than a career with any chance of success, she's probably done better than she has any right too, but she doesn't deserve to be funded to be an also ran.

Difficult for me to accept that "cost" is the issue - when I was living in England, admittedly ages ago, I never had to pay to use public courts. But that didn't yield tennis success at the national level - certainly not after the Roger Taylor / Virginia Wade era, and not much before (Truman, Hayden and Mortimer excepted).

But look at Spain, what's their national summer sport? Apart from Wimbledon, it's doubtful that tennis gets any more than token coverage in the media, let alone as an example for children to participate in. It's all cricket and other sports, even football of course.
Children have to have an example, they won't just pick up a racquet, find someone to play, and turn into Federer.

Going back a bit for some reason most of the winter sports competitors came from the armed services.Bobsleigh and so on.Alcott has punched above her weight.
Played golf at Gloucester hotel(and dry ski slope) many years ago and met a bloke in the bar named Edwards who claimed to be Britains only ski jumper.he was looking for sponsors but my boss declined on the basis that nobody would ever hear of him!!

Harrison.....

Dont get me started on 'England' rugby and cricket teams, which owe more to the 2nd string of South Africa and other countries, that to the talent of English youngsters.

As for funding etc - In my opinion, sport is about winning, and not enough of our youngsters, or for that matter adult sports stars have the winning mentality, you only have to look at Englands national football team to see that.

So for me, funding should be gievn in genral to each sport and not to specific individuals, particularly people like skiiers and tennis players who simply rely on a wildcard at Wimbledon each year.

And a point very much worth a mention, due to the lack of 'something' at the LTA, Andy Murray actually learnt the game in Spain, and did so at his own familly's personal expense!

So funding a tennis player with all the advantages who only gets to a ranking of 230 is OK but funding a girl (who has skied since she was 3 and was one of the best juniors in the world) who manages to make 30 in the world despite the odds being against her is wrong ?
I dont know if you ski at all Super, I do, and if you go to Europe the pistes are packed with English families. Id say an awful lot more kids do actually ski than take part in most other sports, it actually wouldnt suprise me to find that more kids ski once a year in the UK than actually play golf.
Its a great sport that actually involves all the family and doesnt have to be competitive for you to enjoy it.

Diggers wrote:So funding a tennis player with all the advantages who only gets to a ranking of 230 is OK but funding a girl (who has skied since she was 3 and was one of the best juniors in the world) who manages to make 30 in the world despite the odds being against her is wrong ?
I dont know if you ski at all Super, I do, and if you go to Europe the pistes are packed with English families. Id say an awful lot more kids do actually ski than take part in most other sports, it actually wouldnt suprise me to find that more kids ski once a year in the UK than actually play golf.
Its a great sport that actually involves all the family and doesnt have to be competitive for you to enjoy it.

Diggers, I've no problem with promising sports people being supported in the early stages of their career in any sport, however once they reach a level and fail to make a breakthrough as Alcott has I don't believe it is worth funding their deveopment any further, which seems to be the attitude of the governing bodies too, and rightly so.
Much of the problem with British sport is that we continue to support deadbeats in tennis and athletics for far too long, they become complacent and lose hunger even if they do have the requisite talent to succeed.

As for the skiing, I spent 4 very enjoyable seasons in the Alps Diggers and I know what you mean, but recreational skiing is hardly a sport, especially as for most it might total one week a year, regardless of how many people do it from this country. Yes, it's great fun, relatively healthy and no doubt of benefit for young people, but is it really worth continually pouring money into trying to develop talent in a sport where almost every other country has a considerable headstart due to having mountains with snow on them.

It's easy to dismiss rugby and cricket because of a couple of colonial imports but they are two of the biggest sports in this country at youth level and we are competing against countries that have these are their national sports. It doesn't matter if there are 100 other countries or just India between us and being number 1 - if a billion people are fanatical about cricket and we can compete with their country then we can't be doing too bad.

Golf and tennis place far less emphasis on country of origin because of their individualistic nature but realistically the UK could not claim responsibility for the success of Murray, who was shipped off to Spain at a young age, or players like Donald, Wilson, Casey, Laird, McDowell etc that went from good amateurs to the tour via US colleges.

Surely they gained their grounding in the UK though?
I remember reading about the success of Andy and Jamie Murray in the local paper whilst they were still about 10 and 11. So there must be some good grounding in this country.

Super I just know how much I love skiing and feel massively privileged to have had a chance to take part in it. I actually think quite a few of the good young boarders coming through are Brits as well. So I dont begrudge some funding personally if tehy are good enough as juniors.
I dont really class golf as sport for me to be honest, its just a bit of fun and a pastime just like skiing and scuba, of the three skiing easily would give me the most exercise when I do it.

Maybe the answer to the UK's very modest sporting success might be through the eduction system. Cameron's policy of turning schools into academies now means that technically anybody can set up a school (within reason) so why don't our sporting bodies make use of this and create schools that emphasise their respective sports. The same could apply at university level, especially now that fees are rocketing - we should at least have a say in what we are getting from this extra expense and with the many average/mediocre universities offering pointless degrees then this would be far more useful.

Those players that have gone through the collegiate system in the US have been given high levels of coaching, time to practise, proper competition, the odd talk from a specialist (Stockton, Rotella, Pelz etc), the support of ex students on tour, subsidised or free equipment and golf and as a bonus get a good qualification if golf doesn't work out. Sounds better than an 8 hr working week for half the year to get a degree in American History...

They of course had their grounding in the UK SR, but why did they go to Spain?? Surely there was something offered there that there wasnt at the LTA, which is kinda backed up by the fact Murray is top class and most other British tennis players are garbage.

Harrison....

a couple of collonials is a bit of an under estimation, look at the current 1 day squad announced for 'England's' Cricket team, hardly a couple is it!!

That is quiote bad when you consider how popular Rugbay and Cricket are as a national sport in the UK - surely we have more people playing those sports than most countries???

Back to Golf and there is now a US style college course based around Cornwall Duchy college/St mellion and spending the winter in Portugal.
Business studies course and plenty golf/fitness/diet/mental etc.Bad news is its thick end of £15k a year.good progress though rather than having to go to the states

Diggers, having spent a long time in the Alps I've had the pleasure of seeing many of the top European and North American snowboarders in action, I remember seeing Lesley McKenna continually touted as Britains best snowboarder and she was useless, abject rubbish, blown away by Japanese and Norwegian kids who could only have been doing it for a fraction of the time she has.

Junior funding is fair enough, and there are some promising youngsters like Ben Kilner, but if all you manage to be is a journeyman by the middle of your career then there is no point in funding further.

I do resent people thinking they are entitled to funding though, no one is making them be a sportsman, so it's a little rich that they think we (or organisations) should indulge them.

However, grass roots funding is different and I'd be more than happy to add an extra amount to my club membership for the development of junior golf, as that is the future of the club.

JD, the one day team is a step into our test team yet that still has a majority of English players and it is nothing that other countries don't do. Football is littered with dubious nationalities and the strength and reputation of our ECB are the reasons that these players wish to play for England. Our domestic leagues in rugby and cricket are also strong and well respected.

dynamark wrote:Back to Golf and there is now a US style college course based around Cornwall Duchy college/St mellion and spending the winter in Portugal.
Business studies course and plenty golf/fitness/diet/mental etc.Bad news is its thick end of £15k a year.good progress though rather than having to go to the states

And when it's now £9k a year for a mediocre uni studying a pointless degree this type of thing becomes more achievable and enticing...

Wentworth do simliar every year by taking on a group of young players from local areas and giving them the opportunity to develop their golf. Ross Fisher was the product of this.

1. Tennis isn't taught effectively in most schools because it doesn't suit the one teacher to many school model. You can keep 22 or 30 youngsters involved in a game of football or rugby, whereas you can't really coach more than 8 tennis players at once. Also many schools only have two or three courts, not enough for most of the class to play.
2. The LTA is totally absorbed in LAWN tennis, which is not a good grounding for players to become successful. I used to play tennis when I was younger, and I'd never played on a grass court until I was in my 30s. Coaching youngsters to have a huge serve and volley game (which is what the LTA thought would win Wimbledon) is wrong. Coaches are paid by the LTA, so that's what they teach.
3. Many young players join tennis clubs for the wrong reasons - to meet boys and girls of the same age. In my opinion it's a good reason, but not the right reason. Boys join tennis clubs because they know there'll be lots of girls there.
4. Tennis is primarily a summer sport here. Some people play in the winter, but we are very weather dependent. In Spain or the USA it's possible to play inside, or even outside in the winter in the southern states.
5. There are very few big tennis clubs in the UK, where they can afford to pay for good facilities and professional staff. Tennis clubs are often small concerns, run by volunteers on a social basis. Producing Wimbledon tennis stars is not high on their priority list.

George, LAWN tennis does not refer to tennis played on grass, LAWN tennis is the modern version of the game as played on the ATP and WTA and on every surface, e.g it isn't the other version of the game e.g. REAL TENNIS.

SR - from Wiki

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The Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) is the national governing body of tennis in Great Britain, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.
As the governing body, the LTA is responsible for the coaching and development of junior players, offering courses and qualifications on coaching, as well as the organisation and administration of the senior game. Through working with the different groups involved such as clubs, coaches, parents and players the LTA aims to grow the base of the sport and get more people involved in tennis. It organises coaching and tournaments for junior players, as well as senior events throughout the UK.[2]
The LTA is predominantly dependent on the Wimbledon Championships for its income. Over half of the governing body's funds come from the championships, which gives all its profits to the LTA.

________________________________________________________

That's why the LTA is doing the wrong stuff. It's based at Wimbledon, funded by the All England Club, and doesn't understand that most kids play on clay courts, or tarmac, or all weather courts.

Doesn't matter what the funding is, doesn't even matter what the coaching's like, if you can't engage young players before the age of ten, you've no chance of producing good players in any significant numbers.
Waiting for "college" or subsidised education is waiting way too late.

Strange thing is, and I referred earlier to the same problem being prevalent in the States as in GB&I, the majority of top US college tennis squads are made up, not just of Americans, but often mostly by foreigners, Swedes, Eastern Europeans etc.

Bottom line, if you don't have a grass roots programme to attract 4, 5, 6, 7 year olds, get them engaged early, you'll never be successful. (You might of course see analogies betwen GB&I tennis and American-born footballers - the youngsters here hardly ever have a ball at their feet at a very early age, always shooting a basketball instead.)

George, first of all, WIKI is not a reliable or credible source of info on which to base an argument and you still seem to be missing the point I'm making.

LAWN Tennis is the modern version of the game which developed from REAL tennis also known as ROYAL tennis or Court Tennis,and is played on all surfaces. It can be hard court, grass court, clay, concrete, carpet or any other surface, it is still LAWN tennis.

I was a member of a clay court club when younger, whose initials were NLTC, which stood for Newport Lawn Tennis Club. The LAWN element does not relate to the surface being made of grass but rather the format and court dimensions and rules to which the ame are currently played.
You claim the LTA is absorbed in LAWN Tennis and then add it is at the expense of other surfaces. LAWN Tennis is simply Tennis as we know it, I presume you meant to say that they are preoccupied with the grass court surface of the game of LAWN TENNIS?
Many sports are goverened at their most famous venues, The R&A for example.
It doesn't mean they are preoccupied with any particular type of course, e.g links.

Tennis? Maybe it's all that grunting puts kids off!

Scotland's football team was always going to struggle on the international stage at the best of times but once scottish clubs started buying in foreign players that, effectively, brought down the curtain on our game. Ban foreign players from the leagues and then we'll start to improve again.

Someone mentioned (sports) politics. Well, it seems to all be going on at the SGU these days. Dem sniffy areas refuse to give up their power base or is it that they don't relish getting into bed with the slga?

Gael, I think Scottish footballs failure goes far deeper than foreign players, it's a wretched spectacle and might as well be disbanded on an international stage.