Cambridgeshire LTA 8 & under County Programme
Cambridgeshire LTA seeks to provide an open and inclusive programme for 8 &under players in the county to gain access to our county training programme. The ideal is to have 16 boys and 16 girls in total in the County training programme spread over two venues.
Step1 - Club
Step2 – Fun Day in March/April at the end of the winter to look at all the players. Nominations by clubs and coaches can however be made at any time to County Teams Manager (CTM)/Age group captain for 8 and under players via administrator – it is open all the time.
Step 3 – Invite to County Training sessions (normally on a Sunday morning) – min of 8 per term where possible – some local sessions at Huntingdon and Hills Road. Every 3 to 4 weeks there will be a joint session when the best 32 children come together normally at Hills Road.
Our aim is to engage as many clubs and coaches as possible in this pathway, to ensure every promising child has the best opportunity to progress within Cambridgeshire county tennis.
The starting point for all players will be at their club, where inexperienced youngsters will be introduced to the game, learn to play in group coaching, be introduced to competition, and possibly start some one to one coaching to accelerate their progress.
Promising, competitive and enthusiastic club 8 &under players can be nominated at any time to the CTM via the county administrator Joanna Jeffels, by their head coach, to attend local county training sessions.
There are currently two county 8 &under centres in Cambridgeshire. One in Huntingdon, which is accessed by the clubs outside or to the north of Cambridge e.g. Cambourne, 10is Academy (Ely), LK Academy (Wisbech/Chatteris), Peterborough –DL and City and St. Neots. The second centre is in Cambridge at Hills Rd, which is accessed by clubs in Cambridge or to the south of the city e.g. Cambridge LTC, DL Cambridge, Cocks and Hens, Haslingfield, the Cambridge Academy, Titan Tennis and Over&In organisations.
All nominees will be invited to their nearest local county training session to minimise travel (or attend an upcoming county fun day in the summer term), initially for a free assessment. The county training centre lead (Julian Payne in Huntingdon and Sue Rich in Cambridge) will inform Joanna of the outcome of the assessment, and Joanna will communicate the next steps for the player. If the player meets the required standards then they will be invited to attend the combined County Training sessions. Other players may continue to attend their local training to try and reach County level.
Invitations are done on a termly basis. Once in the County training groups then players are expected to compete regularly and play in the County Red Tournament, Club Team events, the Festival of Tennis event in August and be available if selected to play for the County.
Once a player is very good at red then they move onto orange (could be summer term) and the County will look for the next age group of players to become part of the 8 and under programme.
