The starlets of British tennis are being warned to be on their best behaviour in the face of concerns that matchfixing, illegal betting and potentially embarrassing entries on social networking websites are being targeted as a means of undermining the character of the sport. The LTA is concerned that innocent teenage players could be compromised and that a tarnished reputation will stick.
Fifteen months after two of the nations finest prospects were reprimanded for being slightly too forward on their personal Bebo sites, and with suggestions that matches have been fixed at the lower levels of the professional game refusing to die down, a number of the players considered at risk have been sent e-mails insisting that they be on their guard and any inquiries to them from journalists should be met with a no comment and passed to the LTA.
The issue was not raised at yesterdays annual meeting one whose primary function was to extend the term of office of Roger Draper, the chief executive, for five years but the LTA does not want to be dragged through more damaging publicity. It was in September 2007 when Naomi Broady and David Rice had their funding withdrawn and were considered in breach of their contracts, having been too explicit on social networking websites.
Players are being asked to review their internet content and delete anything that may be regarded as controversial. It does not serve the LTA well to deal with more negative publicity, especially as debate continues to rage over the decision to awarded bonuses to prominent members of the tennis leadership team while others on the staff have had their incomes frozen until October next year.
Yesterday, Draper and Stuart Smith, the departing president, acknowledged that performance-related pay was an accepted part of everyones contract and any member of staff was liable to receive additional moneys if they reached the LTAs Measures of Success under which such extras are calculated. These Measures are the number of players inside the top 100 (rising from seven in singles and doubles this year to eight in 2009), those on track for the top 100 an extremely grey area and the total of juniors playing.
The annual meeting was told yesterday that the figure of those juniors competing five times a year is 21,337, a rise of 8,000 on 2007, although there are those in the game who believe that this is an inflated estimate. What cannot be denied is that the LTA remains the only governing body in the world that includes doubles players in its targets for top 100 players.
On performance-related pay, Draper said: Everyone across the board in the LTA is judged on the whole sport plan, the three measures as well as getting more people playing on a weekly and monthly basis, it is about taking tennis to the masses. This is all across the board. What we have done is to tidy up the old practices that used to go on, that were typical of governing bodies saying, Oh, everyone will have a Christmas bonus. It does affect some people because the ones who dont get anything, the ones who dont perform, are the ones who make the most noise.
In the 30 months that Draper has been chief executive, the average ranking of the top ten British players has risen by 60 places on the womens side where the nation has its first player in a decade to end the year inside the top 100, in Anne Keothavong, the world No 61 and fallen by a degree on the mens side. It is arguable, given those figures, that Carl Maes, the head of womens tennis, merits what is believed to be a 19.2 per cent bonus this year, but Draper insisted yesterday that we have given no pay rises this year.
Smith received a standing ovation from the floor of the meeting, from which a single question was raised about the whys and wherefores of the British Tennis Membership scheme. Asked why there were no more questions forthcoming from those who are meant to have the sport at heart, Smith suggested that they might have been put off by the media presence.
