Talk of the Tennis Trail

We receive a lot of letters in response to the Tennis Trail - from children, parents and teachers- and we're always very pleased to receive them. Here you can read some of what they have been saying.

The Children

Eggbuckland Vale Primary School is in Plymouth in Devon and was recently visited by the Tennis Trail. Shortly after we received a whole bunch of letters and pictures from the children at the School who thoroughly enjoyed their introduction to tennis.You can have a look at a few of the letters by clicking on the thumbnails below.

Child on the Tennis Trail

The Parents

Monmouth was one of the Tennis Trail venues visited in 2004. We recently received this email from the parents of one child who took part in one of our school visits:

Myself and other parents would like to thank you all for giving, our children a chance to play Tennis. Through the Monmouthshire Tennis Development Group their representative Mr Tim Smart introduced our children to your foundation, unaware that such an organisation existed, we have received funding for the last two seasons, our children were only five years of age at the time and we were told they showed potential, we have supported them in all weathers indoor and out and just wanted to say we apprciate the chance they have been given with your support.

Grateful thanks to you all

from Bev and Ross Vaughan

We recently received this letter from Mrs Gillian Mapp, a parent whose daughter's school was visited by the Tennis Trail.

My daughter Jessica was introduced to tennis by the Cliff Richard Tennis Foundation just 18 months ago. She is almost eleven and now plays in the County development group/performance group and has individual lessons also supported by the Cliff Richard Tennis Foundation. She now plays at least four times a week and enjoys every minute. I cannot express my thanks to the Foundation for their support and of course to Sir Cliff Richard. I only hope that he is made aware of all the children, like my daughter, that he is introducing to the sport. Kindest Regards, Mrs Gillian Mapp

Jessica Mapp - now playing in her County development group.

It's great to hear that Jessica's introduction to tennis was such an inspiration and we wish her all the best with her tennis. Sir Cliff plays a very active role in the Tennis Foundation and is delighted whenever the Trail introduces another youngster to the sport.

The Teachers

The Southern Road Primary School is in Plaistow, London E13 and was also recently visited by the Tennis Trail. We received this letter from Andrew Farmer, P.E Co-ordinator at the school.

Dear Cliff (and team!)

We would just like to thank you personally and your excellent staff for such a wonderful experience for the children of our school on the Cliff Richard Tennis Trail afternoon. We are a large inner-city primary school of over 800 children in a poor SRB area where children have had little, if any experience of tennis and facilities locally are very limited.

The children were thrilled to participate in the coaching sessions and to receive the kind gifts and I hope it may 'kick start' tennis in the school. I am a very keen P.E. co-ordinator and if you personally even, or your team would like to return to help tennis take root in a mostly ethnic lower working class school, you would be very welcome. Also if you have any posters or spare tennis equipment please do consider us as we are presently writing tennis into our new P.E. schemes of work. Thanks again for a lovely afternoon and your investment in inner-city primary sport, which is so often neglected and forgotten.

Andrew Farmer.

We were also pleased to receive a huge thank you card from teachers at the schools in Southampton, visited by the Trail, and our Head Coach - Paul Regan at the end of last year.

"To Paul & all the team - thank you so much for coming to Southampton. I know it was hard work at times, but it was good for the kids to have a chance to play tennis and the children had a fantastic time"