Minutes of the Bolton Tennis League Committee meeting held at 7pm on Wednesday 16 September at Lostock Tennis Club.

Present: Messrs. Cashmore, Caswell, Pearson, Prince, Nuttall, Saunders, Ms L Cartwright &  Ms J Holmes.

Apologies for absence: Messrs. Al-Chalabi, Maslivec, Smith, Taylor, Ms Francis, Ms Perry & Mrs Browne.

Minutes of the last meeting: These had been circulated and were agreed.

Matters Arising: Vicky Postill was introduced at a previous meeting with a view to joining the Committee and as a possible future junior Match Secretary.

Correspondence: Prestwich A had responded to our reply. To be dealt with at the AGM after being mentioned at the NOM.

Trophy Secretary: The Cecil Cup is in bad condition. It was estimated to contain around £450 of silver. It was agreed that it needs replacing. We will look at samples at a future meeting.

Treasurer: All the ticket money is in for the presentation.

Winter League: The Winter League gets underway on 18th September for the usual 10 weeks of matches. The Arena is unavailable for two weekends with David Lloyd accommodating those matches. There were a few enquiries from clubs wishing to enter a team, but with no withdrawals, their details have been added to others on the waiting list. The number of teams involved therefore remains at 36. We have enough balls from the tournament for the first half of the season. We are always grateful for these. There are a few match fee payments outstanding, so we will chase these up over the next few days.

A discussion took place on the waiting list.

Tournament: We had a post-tournament review meeting on 27th August. Mr Taylor had agreed to be Referee next year with the scheduling being done by two volunteers.

Tournament Report:
The 43rd Annual Tournament was certainly memorable for the warm, sunny weather throughout the whole nine-day tournament. It was the best weather for over a decade and enabled all events to reach the final by the last Friday - usually some semi-finals are played on the morning of finals day. The overall number of entries for the senior events was comparable to 2025, but the number in the junior events decreased, with no U14 Boys Singles, no U14 Girls Singles, nor Junior Girls Doubles able to be held.

In the handicap events, the number of close matches (6-4, 6-4 or 3 sets) was 38 out of 74 matches played, i.e. 51%. This is a much better outcome than in recent years, and clearly the handicapping committee deserve our congratulations.

As usual, all the level finals were held at Markland Hill, and spectators were rewarded with exciting, close matches in all five finals - the last final only finished at 7pm. Both singles finals were three-set affairs with new winners eventually triumphing. The Men's Singles was won by Jake Lane, while the Women's Singles winner was Miriam Meftah - interestingly, both being runners-up in 2025.

On finals day, it was decided that we would dispense with LTA umpires and use scoreboards instead; this seemed to work well. Another change, which was not universally welcomed, was that for the first time we did not have tournament programs.

In conclusion, our main thanks must go to Andy, the Tournament Referee, whose huge efforts ensured all finals were completed on time. Also, our gratitude must go to Liz, the Tournament Secretary, for all her hard work both in the preparatory stages and throughout the tournament. Our thanks are also due to the three host clubs for allowing us to use their facilities for the duration of the tournament, and finally to our own tournament committee for helping ensure the tournament was a success.

(There was an item here from Mr Cashmore re entrants' statistics. Unfortunately, this was missed and will be added to the next meeting)

Presentation Evening: The number of attendees has increased 2026 – 226; 2025 – 195; 2024 – 192. The night had been quite a success. A discussion took place on numbers and room layout.

Rule Proposals: It was agreed that Registration and Eligibility Rule 7 (f) needed a rewrite, as the original rule at the bottom had been amended or added to several times. It would be better if the original rule was at the top. A suggested rewrite had been proposed.

The General Secretary had put forward a rule to hopefully solve the arguments when courts or the weather may be unfit. The Committee were not unanimous about this. The General Secretary would see if his club was prepared to put it forward.

It was said that a proposal had come from Hawkshaw, but the General Secretary had not received it as it had gone to his old email address.

LTA Network: There is a new round of grants of up to £6.000 for LTA-registered clubs. See the LTA website for details.

AOB: Our Chairman intends to step down this year from the Chairman role, but would remain Trophy Secretary. Ms Holmes has agreed to stand for the position.
We need a revised list of Vice-Presidents. Suggestions were made.
It was asked why we need addresses in the handbook. To be added to the next agenda.

Date and Time of Next Meeting: Wednesday, 14 October, 7pm at Lostock TTC.