Leon Smith: 'Competing for Great Britain, Andy Murray always gave 100%'
Back in 2010, Leon Smith had become the leader of the British Davis Cup squad, defeating Turkey 5-0 in Eastbourne and starting an epic journey that completely transformed the nation that played for the first Davis Cup trophy back in 1900. From Group II, Great Britain won 11 of the next 13 Davis Cup ties to write history books and win the first title since 1936 four years ago, beating Belgium in the title match. To promote tennis in Scotland and give the crowd a chance to watch their heroes Andy and Jamie Murray in action, a few Davis Cup ties in the last couple of years were held in Glasgow and it is only a part of the plan to bring the level of tennis in this country to a higher level.
With no new indoor tennis facilities for ten years between 2006-2016, Judy Murray, Colin Fleming and Leon Smith have been working hard in the last couple of years to bring more kids to tennis and offer them a chance to train and compete. The new Tennis Scotland national academy at the University of Stirling will undoubtedly help to produce new tennis stars, with the action kicking off this August under the Brazilian coach Leo Azevedo.
“Days like these are important because tennis will come around in about six or eight weeks, whoosh into the public eye with the grass court season and Wimbledon,” said Smith. “We are here at Gleneagles with various partners who are supporting or might want to support tennis in Scotland. We need to use events, promotional days and tournaments to get people talking about the sport all year round and get people playing it in accessible, affordable ways in a fun environment. This is a British programme and it is really important it remains that way. When Andy has gone out and competed for Great Britain, he always competes to the highest possible standards and with as much passion as anyone can see.
He is so big in Scotland, but he is also big in Britain. So people from all over will walk into that tennis hall and think this is where Andy and Jamie trained, see that huge picture of him, Jamie and Colin above the courts. That is inspiring to anyone. Of course, people want Scottish people to be part of this programme but then it is the role of the clubs and the regional development centers with the 9-12-year-olds to move in. It is tough to put a target to it, you can’t predict what is going to come of that programme, but it gives a sharp focus to the team to develop coaches and nurture the players in this age group.”
from Tennis World USA http://bit.ly/2UAmsVJ
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