Our mission is to Improve Lives Through Racket Sports
Welcome to the Queen’s Club Foundation Summer/Autumn Newsletter 2025. We are extremely grateful for the invaluable support from The Club, its members and our wider supporters.
We have carried out a substantial amount of community outreach this year and, as a result, have had limited opportunity to provide updates. Please find our delayed Summer/Autumn update below. We hope you enjoy reading in particular about our work surrounding the tournament and also the exciting launch of the new inclusion hotspots project.
Kate Maurici
Head of Foundation
Former QCF Community Club Player, Gloria Pearce rallied with Andy Murray on Centre Court during the opening of the Andy Murray Arena (photo credit Getty Images for LTA)
After a private introduction to Andy and Laura Robson, Gloria, who started aged 8 in our Community Club had the inspirational opportunity to partner with Andy on Centre Court at the HSBC Championships. We are grateful to the LTA Tennis Foundation who facilitate inspirational opportunities like these for our Community Club players.
Sonay Kartal visits our Community Tennis event at the Brook Green Parks Event
On the Sunday prior to the start of the WTA HSBC event at Queen's, the QCF partnered with the LTA and CourtFit to deliver an entire day of fun-filled activity on the local courts at Brook Green to over 200 participants. Our team of coaches and volunteers delivered tennis coaching to children, adults and families, encouraging new players to pick up a racket for the first time. The players were also treated to a surprise visit by Sonay Kartal, who joined in a cardio tennis session and gave a Q&A, further inspiring participants at the event.
QCF Community Club player has a lesson from Jack Draper at the HSBC Championships (photo credit Getty Images for LTA)
What started off as a chance for community club player Max Allain to have a quick photo with Jack Draper, ended up as a 15 minute lesson on the grass at the Championships thanks to Jack's commitment to supporting players new to the game. Jack even lent one of his rackets to Max for the session. We are so grateful to Jack for giving up some of his precious practice time to create an unforgettable experience for Max and also to the LTA Tennis Foundation for enabling inspirational on court opportunities for our players during the HSBC events.
Visit by Amanda Anisimova to QCF schools session at St Augustine's Primary (photo credit LTA)
St. Augustines participated in the QCF women & girls cardio schools programme in the run up to the return of the women's event to Queen's. Their teacher, Nicholas Bennett received training by the QCF on how to deliver schools tennis and cardio tennis. He then went onto deliver regular breakfast club school tennis sessions throughout the Spring and Summer term to girls at the school. Nick went on to facilitate over 190 children at his school to access tennis this year. Recognising his fantastic efforts to introduce more girls to the sport. The LTA arranged for Amanda Anisimova to visit a session at the school led by Nick and supported by the QCF.
Centre Court Celebration Event 2025
Just as the de-rig commenced after the tournament, we were lucky to be able to invite children from our Community Club to enjoy a lesson on Centre Court thanks to Queen's Club Chairman, Alan Giddins donating his personal court time to the QCF. Our community club provides free coaching to children from disadvantaged backgrounds who might not otherwise be able to access tennis.
Inclusion Hotspots Project launched with Middlesex Tennis
A Project we are enormously proud of this year is our inclusion hotspots project, which we launched in September with Middlesex Tennis. This project, which will transform local tennis venues' approaches to inclusive tennis was recognised by the LTA during inclusion week. We will be supporting Visually Impaired Tennis, tennis in underserved communities, deaf tennis, neurodiversity in tennis, tennis for the homeless and tennis for female refugees in this exciting 3 year project. To read more about the project, click here.
Surbiton Para-Standing grass court event.
As this was the first year without the LTA grasscourt event, the Surbiton Trophy, the QCF joined forces with Surbiton Rackets and Fitness Club and Surrey Tennis to organise the first ever Para-Standing Competition on grass. This event was supported by QCF ambassador and para-standing player Nicky Maxwell, QC Member and Director at the Club, Roy Staniland, Referee and QCF coach, Jonathan-Pierre Lion, Middlesex Inclusion Lead and Referee Martin Etheridge, inclusion consultant Mark Bullock and Comedian and Para-standing player Adam Hills amongst many others. The QCF delivered a pan disability event for children on the day. The QCF is now an LTA para-standing hub, driving opportunities for para-standing players to enjoy social tennis, train and compete locally.
IPP Coach Forum (photo credit Manna Phanjoubam)
Our inclusive player pathway programme, which supports children with disabilities to enjoy and excel in tennis from community level to performance is funded by a Club member, Aditya Mittal. Aditya's generosity has enabled us to provide, not only community level disability session at various tennis venues, but also to support a scholar's programme with 2 children on course for National level training and competing, as well as our popular workforce development sessions. Our latest coach forum focussed on teaching children with Down Syndrome and was held in a rackets court at the Club. Our next coach forum is on the evening of 28th November, where we will share knowledge about disability tennis in general in a practical on-court session for Club members, as well as a session for Kings College London students, QC staff and QCF coaches and volunteers. This session will be led by expert in inclusive tennis, Sue Morrison.
Dementia Friendly Padel sessions at Padel Social
Our dementia friendly programmes are funded by the LTA Tennis Foundation as part of their grant to the QCF for our Community Hub Project. Padel Social have supported our free dementia friendly padel sessions on this project for seniors for over a year now. It is one of our most popular classes for seniors whose only complaint about the class is that they cannot play more often! Padel is an accessible and sociable way for seniors who might have physical disabilities, dementia, or just find a regular padel session a bit too fast paced. Thank you to the fantastic coaches at Padel Social and to the venue for facilitating this class which delivers huge benefits to those who attend.
IPP Wheelchair session at The Wimbledon Club
The Wimbledon Club were our proud first ever IPP Community Venue, hosting a wheelchair tennis session for children. The Dan Maskell Trust kindly provided the wheelchairs for the session and the Club, led by Director Erwan Nicolas and Junior Head Coach, Bailey Robbins has been incredibly supportive of the class. We are lucky to have Amy Callaby as a parent on the class, who is on the steering group of the SEND Parent Carers group in Wandsworth. Amy has been brilliant in sharing details of the class and helping us to promote the benefits of tennis to children in wheelchairs. We are looking forward to expanding this class even more in 2026. Anyone interested to join, please click here.
King's College Tennis Open Day, supported by the QCF
Thank you to KCL Tennis for inviting The QCF to join their tennis open day in September in Kennington Park. The QCF team (Kate Maurici Head of Foundation, Karin Govan Head Coach, Nicky Maxwell Ambassador and Arjun Singh, QCF volunteer) spoke to the students about the opportunities afforded by QCF for the students to engage with their community and open up tennis to all. Thank you to Anna and Adrien for facilitating the day. Engaging with students is a vital part of what the QCF does, and KCL not only support our coaching team and events, but also raise money for the QCF each year. Click here for more details.
QCF Curriculum Schools Community Squash Programme
Over the past year, our Community Club squash programme has impacted 293 children from local state schools thanks to the free coaching sessions expertly delivered by Head pro Yawar Islam and Robbie Temple and the inspirational opportunities to visit squash events such as the OPTASIA Squash Championships (thanks to Squash Squared).
The QCF squash programme is partly funded by the Philip King Charitable Trust, who have committed to funding the QCF for a 5 year period, driving squash outreach and (thanks to the Club's support for squash scholars), also providing pathways for children to excel at the sport.
Our new term of squash has begun and we are looking forward to watching the skills of the children develop over the next few months before their inter-schools squash competition in March 2026, where they will have the opportunity to showcase their skills.
QCF 10 Year Celebration (photo credit Manna Phanjoubam)
The QCF celebrates its 10th Anniversary this year and we welcomed 120 members and their guests to our 10 Year Celebration Tournament and Fundraising Dinner. While we had hoped for one of the last beautiful September days on the grass, the weather was not on our side but members enjoyed a relaxed social doubles event before attending a dinner hosted by the fabulous Marcus Buckland. Guests at the dinner also watched the video all about QCF funded scholar, Leo Charlesworth-Mark during his visit to the AELTC and his interview with QCF ambassador, Pippa Horn. We also heard a fantastic Q&A with Pippa alongside 2 of our other ambassadors, Nicky Maxwell, President of Para-Standing Tennis and also Naqi Rizvi, World No. 1 totally blind player. Thank you to the enormous generosity of those who donated prizes (including amongst others our QCF ambassadors Dan Evans and Gina Kennedy) members and their guests attending, our auction at the event raised over £30,000 which will all go towards our community outreach activities for 2026. A huge thank you to all those who donated to support the Club's charity.
Thank you and goodbye to trustee, Deane Pennick
This wonderful picture shows our Chair, Will Morse and former QCF trustee and founder member of the QCF, Deane Pennick at the LTA Tennis Awards Ceremony at the National Tennis Centre earlier this year. The QCF was proud to be National Finalist for the second year running in the Connecting Communities Award Category, a recognition of the success and impact of our outreach programmes. We will miss Deane's enthusiasm and support for the QCF and in particular his passion for driving outreach in rackets and Real Tennis and his considerable efforts to secure funding for our programmes. Deane although no longer a trustee will continue to support the QCF and we will be announcing soon his new role in this respect.
QCF Christmas Campaign
We launched our Christmas fundraising campaign last week. In order to continue delivering our valuable outreach work to the community, improving lives through racket sports, we need your support.
Please click on our fundraising link to donate. Any amount, however small will help us and if you would like to become a Friend of the QCF, by making a regular donation, this will assist us even more. Further details can be found on our website.
Dates for your diary
Thursday 20th-Friday 21st November
QCF Real Tennis Outreach days at the Sir John Ritblat Tennis Open in association with the Tennis And Rackets Association.
Friday 28th November
Members Disability Tennis Event 5.45pm at Queen's Club. For booking details contact [email protected]
Monday 8th December
QCF Christmas Drinks for Members and Invited Guests at Queen's Club.
Wednesday 10th December
QCF Christmas Carols on the terrace at Queen's Club: Members' Event
Monday 22nd December 3pm-5pm
QCF Family Tennis Festival at The Queen's Club. Contact the QCF team for further details
Sponsors
We are always looking for sponsors to support our community club festivals and events. If you would like to match-fund a QCF campaign linked to a festival, or event, or if your company would like to support an event with a major donation, please contact us to discuss at [email protected]
A huge thank you to our equipment sponsors, Wilson
A call for volunteers
We are also always looking for people to support our outreach work. If you would like to join our database of volunteers, please send an e-mail to [email protected]. We have a variety of ways in which you can assist us, and would be delighted to discuss how you can help.
We are particularly grateful to our sponsored athletes, Sam Kimpton and Arjun Singh who raised money for us this year with fundraising runs and also to all the volunteers who have assisted at our events.