Pocklington
Pocklington
TENNIS CLUB
Pocklington Tennis Club has been making tremendous progress in recent
times both on and off the court. Sport Yorkshire Magazine recently caught
up with their Chairman Chris French to find out more about the good
work the club has been doing lately.
Involvement
He told us, “I joined Pocklington
Tennis Club in 1987. I had met my now
wife Val who was absolutely tennis
mad. My only option was ‘If you can’t
beat them, join them’. I had played
tennis in the village where I grew up
near Beverley but our group of young
ones were never accepted by the seniors
despite us being able to more than
compete with their standard.
It took me a while to get back into
playing tennis at Pocklington having
had a gap of some fifteen years. I was
the last player to use a wooden racquet
at Pocklington Tennis Club. My wife
Val was one of the more accomplished
players on the local tennis circuit but we
have never been able to set foot on the
same court together. Domestic harmony
in our house does not reach that far.
From first walking into Pocklington
Tennis Club I knew we would be able
to form a great club that is inclusive
and would welcome anyone in to play
tennis.”
The Role
“I became Chairman of Pocklington
Tennis Club in 1999 and realised that
we had to move the Club forward
into the next century. Unfortunately,
grass courts which we had two of at
Pocklington were not in good shape and
were very expensive to maintain. The
Club, through our previous Chair and
one of our committee members worked
behind the scenes to obtain funding to
convert the grass courts and hard courts
into all-weather tarmacadam painted
courts.
I had a brief interlude in my
Chairmanship for ten years before
returning to the role in 2014. On my
return we formed a new committee at
the club with every person having a
specific role. With a team we managed to
obtain funding from the East Riding of
Yorkshire Council, the L.T.A., Yorkshire
Tennis and Pocklington Town Council
to move the Club up to date with a new
clubhouse, floodlights, security fencing
with a gate entry system and disabled
facilities.”
Atmosphere
“The mood of the Club is excellent,
the Club continues to move forward
with its development. The membership
have been bamboozled with new
floodlights to play under, but now they
have to use their smart phones to gain
entry to the Club, book a court and have
the floodlights switched on. No time to
relax at Pocklington!”
www.sportyorkshire.net
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