David's Best Tips:

• Planning permission may not be required for building a grass court in your back yard.
• Allthough the stipulated area for a tennis court is 120 feet by 60 feet, 110 by 55 is adequate for most people and can shave thousands off the cost.
• Putting fencing only around the backs of the court saves money and is visually less intrusive.
• Cutting the corners off at 45 degrees doesn't effect play but instead is visually more pleasing and it also trickles the balls to the centre of the court behind the baseline.

Click Play Button Now to listen to our Tennis Court Conversation

I had a big disappointment once. There was a lovely grounds man at Millfield. I mean he was like an artist. To say he cut grass for a living was ridiculous. Jerry Wilson was his name and he was a top quality man. He had played county cricket so he knew grass...but the preparation of a grass court.... he was an artist type person and he understood... you only had to talk to him and he understood or he certainly knew what to do. The head grounds man at Wimbledon was going to retire and one of the people up there knew I worked at Millfield and he said, "What sort of grounds man have you got up there?" I said to him there's this fellow, Jerry Wilson, he's a bit of a star, he really know what's going on. You'll never get a better grounds man than if you if employ Jerry Wilson, and they offered him the job, and he turned it down for love of Millfield.

Wow.

I was ... I understood exactly where he was coming from but it was such a disappointment because I thought that you'll never get a better job than the grounds man at Wimbledon. It's a superb.... very... how can I say.... you've got to be very careful at Wimbledon to do things properly, so it's an exacting job, and I suppose it's stressful to a certain degree, but you know to able to say I was the head grounds man at Wimbledon... gee... fantastic. Anyway... So this sort of grounds man type of activity is basically something that ever everyone ought to be doing that owns a tennis court. Even a tarmac court can be cared for. Well nobody should play tennis that hasn't tended a court. That's my opinion. I made my two sons who are professional coaches now, before they did anything, they ball boy'ed and they also tended my court. So I made sure that they went round and did certain things to go around... to get the feel and the love of tennis you have to have tended a court properly. I was brought up that way. I had to ... if I wanted to play of a Sunday morning which I always did, I had to dray and roll and sweep the lines of the lines of the shale courts that I used at the little local tennis club....

So when you tend a court that's basically just preventing the court from deterioration and making sure it that it remains smooth. Is that what it means?

Yes...You gradually get into it. I mean to begin with you wonder what on earth you're doing it for, but once you've tended it and you understand it the court always plays better once you've tended it. Now this even happens on... you want to extend the life of a tarmac court. What you do is ... as the court dries out, so some of the more predominant stones, only slightly prominent; they break off so you get like a little loose stone. Not one, you might get half a dozen might or a dozen in one match might break loose. They act like ball bearings so they will create a hole in the end, and so gradually...

Because people are treading on them?

Yeah, they're scuffing along with them.

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