Tennis academy project in doldrums

KARACHI: The national tennis academy project of Pakistan Tennis Federation (PTF) is in doldrums again because of the absence of a coach.

“They hired a Turkish coach-cum-trainer at a salary of 1500 dollars a month to run this academy but he refused to come,” said a source. The source added that this was shocking for PTF and they were now desperately looking for another foreign coach, from Sri Lanka or some other country.

“This is very unfortunate because PTF doesn’t offer even $500 to local coaches for this job,” said the source. But PTF secretary Gul Rehman told ‘The News’ that the programme was still intact. “Faruq (the Turkish coach) has some personal engagements, but he will join us soon,” he said.

He added that this was an important project and had to be started as soon as possible because all arrangements for this academy had been made. “We will finalise things in a day or two and this academy will start working under the supervision of a foreign coach,” said Gul.

It is worth adding here that National Tennis Academy (NTA) was inaugurated in August 2017. It was to be run by former Davis Cuppers Hamid-ul-Haq and Mushaf Zia.

On the occasion, PTF president Salim Saifullah Khan stated that the academy would be developed into a state-of-the-art facility with the aim of producing top quality players.

PTF failed to run it even for two months and the facility got closed. PTF announced opening the academy with a foreign coach in the beginning of 2019, placing an advertisement seeking a foreign coach. The NTA offers training from beginners to advanced levels.PTF recently converted old clay courts at PTF Complex into synthetic hard surfaces for the academy.