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| Sunday, 2 May 2004 |
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SLTA's new move should bear fruit Straight Talk by Lal Gunasekera Give credit where credit is due. Well done, the Sri Lanka Tennis Association (SLTA), its administrators and young players. The reason - gaining promotion to Group III of the Davis Cup (Asia/Oceania Zone) since stagnating in Group IV since 1999 for "too long". A sum of Rs. 1.7 million was spent from SLTA funds for the Davis Cup and training started in October last year (2003) with 16 players which was reduced to six in January this year. Then came India's Enrico Pipeno who trained our players for about a week and travelled with some of the juniors overseas as well. These players realised what serious tennis was all about. The Davis Cup players did not have any objective and what to look forward to. They were like frogs in a well. The Lankans were then taken to Bombay for two weeks to practise with some top Indian Players - all arranged by Pipeno. The players now knew what was required of them in Jordan and Pipeno himself confided in the SLTA boss Suresh Subramaniam that Sri Lanka will win! And win they did in grand style, beating Bangladesh (3-0), Iraq (3-0), Myanmar (2-1) and Kyrgistan (3-0) to gain promotion together with Saudi Arabia into Group III next year (2005). Now the players know what is expected of them and the SLTA is planning to have an international tournament in Colombo every month in an attempts to gain promotion into Group II in 2006. It will be recalled that Sri Lanka reached the semi-finals of Group II for four consecutive years (1989 to 1992) before the deterioration set in. Another lesser known reason for Sri Lanka's success is the mental and physical training put in by the Argentinian coach Guilermo who is now attached to the SLTA. He got the players to jog for two hours on the beach once a week apart from their other training. This did wonders. Sri Lanka, however, has a long way to go and cannot be complacent. Aggreko and People's bank have been the main sponsors of SLTA who hopes to rope in more if the country fares well in the ongoing Junior Davis Cup in Colombo and reach the World Group. They (the SLTA) hopes to send more players for international tournaments - within the next three months, four juniors are to be sent for the Asian Circuit, while Franklyn Emmanual is to play in the European Circuit in July-August. The SLTA also hopes that a player could earn at least US Dollars 500 per month as prize money and this is one of the reasons in having them play in one international tournament a month. An Indian player earns a minimum of Ind Rs. 10,000/= a month as prize money. Rapid progress has been made by the SLTA since 1999 when there were only three ranking tournaments. In 2003, this increased to 20 ranking tournaments and eight international tournaments in Colombo, while this year (2004), there are 25 ranking tournaments and 10 international tournaments. The idea is to have at least three ranking tournaments a month with much more prize money on offer. The Mini Tennis programme of the SLTA which started under Maurice Fernando's tenure has now spread to nine regions with 45,000 children been involved from 48 schools, including Jaffna and Batticaloa and its catching on. The SLTA is aiming at getting about 4000 of them playing tennis. Funding this programme is by the SLTA itself who are negotiating with some top mercantile establishments to move in as sponsors. They (the SLTA) plans to take this programme now to Galle and Matara too and Dinith Pathiraja is in sole charge. One major problem facing the SLTA is the lack of proper qualified coaches. They have only 15 at present. There was a Level II ITF examination where 25 coaches participated, but only two qualified. Nine coaches are based in the outstations. Now, Shuzo Matsuoka, a Japanese, who is a board Director of the ATF is to arrive in Sri Lanka to research our junior tennis scene and suggest a development programme for the juniors and also conduct coaching classes. He entered the quarter-finals of the men's singles at the 1998 Wimbledon Championship and lost to Pete Sampras. Wheelchair Tennis is another area that the SLTA has done wonders. These disabled soldiers have brought credit to the country by faring well in Thailand, Malaysia, France, New Zealand and Australia and have drawn two "wild card" entries for the Para Olympics to be staged in Athens. They too lack support and SAGT (South Asia Gateway Terminals) has come forward with a Rs. 1 million sponsorship package. However, what is really necessary for these wheelchair personnel is basic facilities like public transport and toilets. |
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