Local and National Tournament Calendars Released

Tuesday, 14 July 2020

We are excited to announce the Local and National Tournament Calendar for 2020.

While we are still in Alert Level 1, it will be our responsibility to ensure all of our players, parents and coaches can be reassured all events will be conducted within a safe environment. Players and support persons will be asked to stay at home if you are feeling sick, and everyone should continue to practice good hygiene at all times.

"After a month and half back in full training mode, it is time to go back to compete" says Christophe Lambert, Tennis NZ High Performance Director. "Playing tournaments and matches is part of the development of a player, getting the confidence and the understanding of the game has to be worked also in a competitive environment."

Local Calendar
The July school holidays will be filled with tournaments all over the country, with other events being introduced over weekends and other times, maximising everyones playing opportunity.

"I'm excited to see so many playing opportunities for all players throughout New Zealand now we are at Alert Level 1" says Blake Taylor, Tennis NZ Tournament and Events Manager. "We have worked together through many scenarios of returning to tournaments, and have agreed to focus on playing locally for a few months while we recalibrate and settle into our new normal."

Get ready to compete locally, and continue your preparations for the National events.

National Tournament Calendar
The National tournament calendar is now available for all events through to the end of 2020.

"Every year I look forward to another season of our National tournaments," says Blake Taylor. "After a crazy year so far, we are excited to still be able to offer all of our events in 2020, albeit in a slightly different order."

View full calendar

A letter from Christophe Lambert, Tennis NZ High Performance Director

Dear players, parents and coaches,
 
After a month and half back in full training mode, it is time to go back to compete. Playing tournaments and matches is part of the development of a player, getting the confidence and the understanding of the game has to be worked also in a competitive environment.

It does not really matter against who you are playing for the moment, what it matters is coming back to play matches in a tournament. Surely playing practice matches help on the player’s development but you will never replace the values of playing in a more stressful situation where the player will be tested. As we have no real idea when the international calendar will be resume, it is very important that all the players, included the best, compete in our local events.

I am pretty sure that no players have planned their training to peak in the next few weeks, so playing tournaments during the school holiday period will help the coaches to adapt and perfect the training plan so players are fully ready to jump on any tournaments which has been chosen to be the peak one or important.

Professional players never comeback to play a major event first. Murray, Monfils, DelPotro for the men and Azarenka, Dokic, Kutnetsova for the females and many less famous have played challengers or ITF to get back to play major events. There is no shame to play local events, it is part of a tennis player’s life to start again and again.

Matt Alexander, TNZ National development coach, has done a big piece of work during lockdown to collect the datas from all the NZ junior players competing in NZ and abroad. The result of this research has shown that junior kiwis are not playing enough matches nor the right matches.

The full result of the research will be available very soon but you can find the guidelines HERE.

As there are no other events happening outside NZ, or we can not really travel outside NZ, it is important that players play in NZ against other NZ players locally. As TNZ Director of HP it is great to have the opportunity to watch players competing, witness their improvement and have a direct contact with the players but also with the parents and coaches.

I really hope I will see many of you on the court during the school holidays competing and enjoying the return to why all the players train for: winning matches and winning tournaments. - Christophe

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