AS THE TALK of establishing either a professional or semi-professional road tennis league in Barbados continues to heat up, one issue has come to the forefront surrounding the progress of the indigenous sport.
If there is one thing that president of the Belfield Road Tennis Club, Mervyn Lythcott, five-time island champion, Keith “Grell” Griffith, and tournament organizer Tito Ellis have in common, it’s that they believe there needs to be unity in the road tennis fraternity if Barbados is to take the sport to the next level.
Lythcott, a former road tennis champion who also acts as coach at his club, told MIDWEEK?SPORT that for road tennis to reach the professional stage, organizers, players and corporate Barbados needed to be on the same page.
“A professional road tennis league is something that I was hoping would happen from when I was playing tennis in the 70s,” he revealed.
“But right now one of the most important things is for all the shareholders to come together and sit down and come up with the best possible plans so that we can take road tennis in Barbados to the next level.”
Lythcott noted that the game had come a long way since the 1970s and 80s and he said that if something was not done to improve the image of the sport in Barbados, “the rest of the world would eventually catch and surpass us”.
He also said there was a need for the establishment of road tennis clubs around the island, with Belfield being the lone road tennis club in Barbados.
Griffith, one of the early greats of road tennis, said that one of the biggest obstacles in the way of the sport’s development was the disunity among key personnel.
He said everybody was “trying to do their own thing”.
“The first thing that has to happen is that the respective personnel need to come together and form one entity if this is to work,” he said.
“Right now road tennis is primed to take off and it is time to give the fans what they have been longing for for a long time.
“But, as it stands right now, there is a lot of squabbling going on, and this person isn’t agreeing with that person. It can’t work out if everybody is not on the same page.”
The person behind the success of the recently held De Village Camp road tennis tournament, Ellis said he hoped to use the competition to help launch a competitive league.
However, he too admitted that disharmony was the main reason behind the sport’s stagnant state.
“The time has come in Barbados for road tennis to reach the next level,” he said.
“The thought of a professional league is a fantastic idea and something which road tennis really needs.
“But right now, because certain people don’t see eye to eye and because they have different views on certain things, they aren’t willing to come together to discuss the way forward for road tennis.”
