Dedicated Smithers handed league accolade

MORETON-in-Marsh B captain Gavin Smithers has been named the best individual administrator of 2017 in the Wildmoor Spa Tennis League.

Smithers has been the captain and contact for the Moreton B team in the Summer League for the past four years since 2014 and is also the Division Five organiser for the league.

League secretary Corin Bishop, who selected the winner of the prestigious Millennium Scroll, said: “His record this year and in previous years has been impeccable and he is thoroughly deserving of this award.”

Smithers has been playing and organising tennis at Moreton since 2009 when he moved from Redditch to Broadway and joined the Moreton club.

Smithers thanked the Wildmoor Spa League for recognising the role of the club captain/contact and his players who consistently turned out in all weathers, making his job as captain much easier.

Smithers played tennis at Durham on clay as a teenager, then on grass at Oxford as a university student. He did not play again until his eldest son was being coached at Alcester and he wanted to give him a game. His son is currently in the USA teaching tennis to young children.

Smithers spent 20 years in banking and sales, ran his own business and worked as a business consultant in the public sector. Since 2009, he has been a private tutor and writer and has sold 14,000 books through his Amazon page – study guides for English Literature GCSEs and A-Levels.