Fathers uses lockdown to embrace technology
THE reopening of grassroots tennis facilities yesterday meant a return to action for some of Britain’s best juniors.
While elite sport has been able to continue through the last two lockdowns, that has not been the case for academies and regional development centres like Bolton Arena, which hones the skills of the next generation of tennis talent.
The centre, the premier development venue in the north west, has been closed since early January, as it was last spring and November, forcing head coach Steven Fathers to think on his feet.
“The last 12 months have been a challenge in a sense that all the players at our academy are serious tennis players, some aspire to be professionals,” Fathers said.
“They live, eat and breathe the sport. To then take that away from them, it was straight away ‘what can we do to keep them enthused, to challenge them, to continue their development?’”
Fathers came up with a programme of online education and training for players and coaches, as well as opportunities for the youngsters to talk to professionals like Australian Open doubles champion Joe Salisbury and American Christina McHale.
“I’d never heard of Zoom,” said Fathers. “It was a whole new world for me because I’m not particularly au fait with all the technical side. I learned on the job.
“We really got a huge response from across the academy. This final lockdown has been the toughest by a long, long way. It’s been challenging not just for the players, but for the coaches to reinvigorate the whole cycle again.
“The vast majority of the players have really embraced it, and it’s even surprised me because I thought this was going to be a really tough sell. We’ve really tried our best to help everybody in the whole region as well as Bolton Arena.
“We had a sport psychologist come on and do a parent education session, which I thought was really powerful, because obviously the mental health side of these lockdowns is going to have an impact maybe for years. We tried to get ahead of the curve there.”