CANCELLED: due to adverse weather conditions, this afternoon’s Mixed American Tournament at St Ann’s Tennis (Sat 22 May) is cancelled. All entry fees will be refunded. Thanks for your interest. We will re-arrange for a future date.

About the tournament
Each player will be randomly assigned a court and a partner. At the conclusion of the set (7 games), the winners will split: ladies to the next court ‘up’, men to the next court ‘down’. [*] The losing pair will stay on court but split, awaiting their new partners. Repeat! We’ll aim for seven sets each. All players keep their own scores, and submit them at the end.

To be super clear, you can enter with a buddy, but the pairings are random, so you cannot guarantee playing together.

Sets: these will follow the same format as Sunday club sessions. Each doubles ‘set’ is seven games in total, regardless of the score. So it could be 0-7, 1-6, 2-5, 3-4 etc. Spin to determine choice: to serve, or chose your preferred end. Pairs switch ends after 4 games (after each player has served once). The set is over after seven full games. Move on to the next game.

We will play sudden death deuces to keep things moving. That means you play normally to deuce, advantage, game. But if the score goes back to deuce a second time, that point – second deuce – becomes a ‘sudden death’ point to decide the game. Every game matters! The winners will be the players who have won the most games overall in all their different pairings.

St Ann’s will provide fresh balls, a tournament director and prizes for best female and best male players.

[*] LADIES: if you’re on court 2, you move ‘up’ to Court 3, or if on Court 4, you move ‘up’ to Court 1 etc. MEN: you move ‘down’ from Court 2 to Court 1, or ‘down’ from Court 1 to Court 4 etc