Meeting: 18^th September 2006.

Present: John Gregory (chair); Louis Davies; Iris Duffy; Tony Rideout; Geoff Muxworthy; David Griffiths.

Apologies: Don Prosser; Craig Ingham.

In the absence of D.P., D.G. took the minutes.

1. Previous minutes.

Sarah’s situation still not resolved and her insurance status not known. T.R. to continue to try to resolve this with Craig.

The status of G.M. resolved.

J.G. reported that he had been in contact with H and H Sports and expected further contact with them next week. He hoped that they would be able to visit the club to give an opinion on future maintenance of courts 1 to 3, but an early estimate of the cost to renovate these courts was £7500.

G.M. thought that courts 1 to 3 were slippery due to growth of moss. J.G. to speak to Cliff Safrass about this.

Netting has been returned to Langland.

Agreed that money held by tennis section could be used to pay for hire of Morfa courts during recent junior tournament.

The club tournament has been completed. Suggested that next year a seeding system should be introduced. A successful B.B.Q. rounded off the event. Many thanks to Iris and Don for all their hard work.

Bouncy castle – no letter sent to management but apparently it has been used in the club on 2 occasions.

T.R. presented a list of "dos and don’ts" to guide club captains in their relationship with juniors.

The previous minutes were proposed and agreed.

2. Coaching.

An e-mail had been received from Mark regarding friction between members and a coach on a mixed social night, when members insisted on playing on the top 3 courts, forcing the coach to take his pupils to the bottom courts. Mark had emphasised the need to retain juniors the numbers of which were falling.

J.G. said that the club needs juniors and that a parent might spend more on coaching fees than a full senior membership. However he felt that some members didn’t want juniors

I.D. commented that having stewarded many mixed nights she had found it much easier to have the top 6 courts available and could not see why coaching could not be done on the lower 6, accepting that current rules allowed coaching on court 1.

D.G. asked how many senior members had originally joined the club as juniors, but no one present could give an answer. He disagreed with J.G. that senior members were anti junior but pointed out that he (D.G.) had presented to management (at the request of management) a series of questions signed by 30 senior tennis members indicating their concern that too much emphasis was being given to coaching and junior development. No one he’d spoken to had been against junior membership but all had felt that the pendulum had swung too far in favour of juniors and coaches. He wondered how many senior members had left the club or taken reduced membership because of this. D.G. further felt that the tennis committee should represent the views of the voting membership as a whole but that too often they individually pursued policies that reflected their own interests.

J.G. asked if D.G. would minute his (D.G.’s) comments.

All present agreed with T.R. that we have to honour agreement made regarding coaching and that seniors have to accept that they may have to give way to coaching. Court 1 is a coaching court at least until 7pm.

It was agreed that L.D. would speak with Mark to give our view.

3. Courts: J.G. to speak with Cliff Safrass and then to decide when to close courts 7, 8 and 9 for the winter.
4. Treasurer: No change in balance. I.D. declared £37.00 to add as revenue from tournaments. The L.T.A. has refunded £1250 as a result of the amalgamation of Tennis Wales North with Tennis Wales south. This money will go into general club funds and not be available for exclusive use by the tennis section.
5. Matches/Tournaments. Mini tennis tournament to be held on 29^th September.
6. Social. I.D. hopes to run a function next month in support of Breast Cancer Awareness.