Last season was a challenging one for the Club with so many teams gaining promotion but the Club still held its own in the Leagues.
The Mens B team were promoted to the 1st division for the first time and the newly promoted Mixed A team consolidated their position in the Oldham League.
A notable success of course was the Ladies A team’s retention of the Ladies first division trophy – a great result given the quality of several of the teams in that division.
The format for this season will be similar to last, with teams in the mens first division playing each other 3 times. At the Manchester League AGM in February, a couple of changes to the playing format were agreed and these are highlighted below:
• The start time for matches in the Manchester League will now be 6.45pm instead of 6.30pm this is for all senior teams
• The mens first & second divisions will now only be playing a single long set as against each pair, which has been the format in the mens 3rd division and the ladies divisions for some time.
At this meeting a discussion also took place about the health of league tennis in this area, as over the last 30 years there has been a continual loss of Clubs able to field teams. This to a large extent mirrors the decline in tennis participation nationally but it was acknowledged that we could be doing more in this area.
There is now a real likelihood that in order to maintain a strong league in the North Manchester area that the Leagues will merge. How this will work has not yet been agreed as discussions are only at a preliminary stage and any changes that do emerge will not take place until at least next season but if anyone has any suggestions then please let your captains know.
2015 Captains
Mens 1st team – Chris Lord
Mens 2nd team – Keith Garton
Mens 3rd team – Phil Handley
Ladies 1st team – Sue Marcroft
Ladies 2nd team – Christine Fitzmaurice
Ladies 3rd team – Liz Owen
Oldham League A – Alan Millington
Oldham League B – Mike Tasker
Under 14’s (2 teams) – Dom Hunt
Under 17’s – Joanne O’Hanlon
Mixed Autumn League A team – Sue Marcroft
Mixed Autumn League B team – Deana Kaye
Mixed Autumn League C team – Keith Garton
