Booming New Mills Tennis Club could be a record-breaker?

New Mills Tennis Club is enjoying a membership boom '“ and the newcomers could soon be members of a record-breaking club.

Committee member Chris Morton is looking into the possibility that when they played a gruelling five league games in as many days a few years ago, it was the first time that had been done anywhere.

In the meantime, they are enjoying a big influx of members, which Chris said he could not pin down to one factor.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“I think there are a number of reasons,” he said. “ A lot of people are moving to the High Peak from city areas as we have more green spaces and want to enjoy some sports like tennis.

“We definitely have a population increase with a lot of new houses being built in Whaley, Chapel, Glossop and New Mills.

“We also have good links with schools, picking up parents and families.

“We have on the way to 80 members now and people joining all the time.”

Hide Ad

The club is based on Church Road, New Mills, and has a busy schedule.

Hide Ad

Chris explained: “We run a good men’s team in Division Two of the North East Cheshire League and a mixed team in Division Five of the East Cheshire Winter League.

“Since April we’ve staged a social tournament on the first Sunday of every month which has gone well. And we stage a men’s singles at the New Mills Festival in September. We were quite lucky with the weather last time and got a lot of interest.

“We are hoping to organise more events around Wimbledon and hope to have some high profile players come up to play at New Mills.”

Hide Ad

Tennis seems to be enjoying a general boom in interest too and Chris said: “I think Andy Murray’s success at the top has helped as had up and coming players like Kyle Edmund. Also there is more tennis on TV now and it’s being marketed more.

“It’s a sport you can pick up at any age. You can just come down and try it out before joining.

Hide Ad

“The LTA have helped with their Transforming British Tennis Fund which UK clubs can access to enhance their tennis facilities.”

Now only time will tell if New Mills can officially be called record-breakers.

Hide Ad

“Back in 2012 the summer was awful,” said Chris. “It was like monsoon weather and we had lots of games postponed.

“By the beginning of July we should have played eight games but had only managed to play two. We kept starting them but having to abandon them before we’d played the minimum 10 sets.

“We even had a couple of games where teams came here twice and suffered a double postponement.

Hide Ad

“In the end we decided to play five matches on five consecutive nights from Sunday through to Thursday. On tarmac that was quite a physical challenge and I can remember how my body felt afterwards.

Hide Ad

“I wondered at the time if that might be a world record as I don’t know of any team in any sport that have played five games in five days. I just never got round to checking.

“But we are now looking into it and it would be great of it ended up being a world record.”

If you want to join the club or find out more information visit

https://sites.google.com/site/newmillstennis/or email [email protected].

Related topics: