Tennis: Ambitions to keep young stars in Wales

Niall Pickerd-Barua described his second Junior National Championships in a row as "amazing"

At just 12 years old, Niall Pickerd-Barua from Cardiff is a British tennis champion for the second year in a row.

But budding talents like him might have to move out of Wales to progress, says a senior figure in the sport.

The current elite pathway has led young player Mimi Xu, from Port Talbot, to the National Tennis Academy in Loughborough, Leicestershire.

Chris Lewis of Tennis Wales said moving to England could be a choice Niall and his family would have to make too.

Niall took home the boys' under-14 cup at the Lexus Junior National Championships in Nottingham.

"If they can get to that sort of standard by Niall's age, that transition to a national academy, albeit not in Wales, that's the route that we have in Great Britain for them," said Mr Lewis.

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"Our current pathway is that we really try and work and develop these players in Wales until they're 14.

"And then, if they're good enough, they go off to the national academy."

Mr Lewis said a national tennis centre in Wales would give the best young Welsh talent the option not to move away.

"There is ambition to enable players to stay in Wales if if they want to," he said.

"The reality for us is that we don't currently have a national tennis centre.

"The closest we had was closed back in 2013, so we've had a period of time with no national centre to base a national programme to the level which the top players would need.

"Do we aspire to have a national academy for Welsh tennis? Yes, absolutely."

Mimi Xu took part in Junior Wimbledon at 15

Having already made the move to the National Tennis Academy in Loughborough, Mimi Xu was crowned singles champion at the 2022 LTA Under-18 Junior National Championships.

"From an early age you could see she had a lot of potential," said Mr Lewis.

"She's always been quite exceptional really and it's always felt like she's a year or two ahead of players around her - even in Great Britain - at her age.

"She's been national champion of Great Britain several times, and obviously made a really young debut at Junior Wimbledon."

Following Mimi and Niall's successes, Mr Lewis said the next step for Welsh Tennis was "global representation".

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"Our ambition is to have a a global star that fans in Wales can really get behind," he said.

Niall described winning the British championships for the second time as "amazing".

"I had a really good feeling about the tournament," he said.

"Being the defending champion after last year I had a lot of confidence.

"As the matches went on, my game only got better and in the final I found my best game."

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