Anyone for... Pickleball?

In my thirties I was fortunate enough to be invited by a large conglomerate to Wimbledon for a couple of days. This was in the days when lavish corporate hospitality was quite the norm.

Although much frowned upon now I can honestly say that I was never influenced to make a purchasing decision as a result. Like most people I don’t like being sold to, and that is something we clearly understand at Chancery Lane.

Spending time with senior executives however, opened up valuable lines of communication which facilitated conversations to explore opportunities and solve problems.

The company concerned had hired retired tennis ace Rod Laver as its ambassador and he spent time with us over lunch and dinner the first day. In between times he variously sat in the Royal Box or commented on tv and radio.

At the time he was officially listed as the world’s best tennis player only recently being overtaken by Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic, but he was the most charming, kind, and modest person you could hope to meet.

For the following day Rod had offered to give anyone who turned up an early morning tennis lesson, but after a full day and long evening of corporate overindulgence only one person made it. Me!

I had the world’s best tennis player to myself for an hour, at the end of which I thanked him and said it would be an amazing thing to tell my children that I had played with Rod Laver.

With his gently spoken Australian accent he said, “I don’t care if you tell them you beat me!”

What a Gent.

During his playing career he earned prize money of about $1.5m although his wealth is estimated at $20m, so corporate and broadcasting work have served him well. By contrast Djokovic has won $170m so far!

Last week friends invited us round to give their freshly modified tennis court a bash at a game I had never heard of before, Pickleball.

A quick trawl of YouTube gave us an idea of what it was all about, and we were surprised to see it was invented in 1965.

Billed as a game for all ages and one of the world’s fastest growing sports, Pickleball is a cross between tennis, badminton, and ping pong, played on a court about a third the size of a tennis court.

It is a great game, and we thoroughly enjoyed our first session, soon to be repeated.

The race for fastest growing sport is against Padel, a cross between tennis and squash, so requiring a walled court. I have not played it, but other friends are addicted to it.

In February this year Esquire Magazine published a piece about the contest.