Boosting tennis development

Getting Rarotonga children to play and stay with tennis has been the aim of the recent visit by acting International Tennis Federation Pacific Oceania development officer Gene Ridgway.

Over the four-day tennis workshop, Ridgway, who is based in Fiji, has been taking national coach Malcolm Kajer and a number of assistant tennis coaches through their paces starting with some fun filled development games.

Ridgway introduced the new ‘stay and play’ tennis programme to the local tennis federation – a programme that has been developed to share the fun of tennis to any beginner player regardless of age.

”Stay and play tennis is a new way of introducing tennis to players of all age and getting them to playing straight away – that’s serving, rallying and scoring,“ says Ridgway.

On his short visit, Ridgway has met with the tennis association and admired the international standard courts in Nikao.

”This is a beautiful and great little island and the tennis facility here and the location – just beautiful.“

Ridgway is impressed at the tennis development work by national coach Malcolm Kajer and hopes that after his short course with the local tennis association, the development of the sport will continue to flourish and grow top tennis players.