Andrew spent a career on and around the pro tennis tour. In the 1970’s and early 1980’s he played professionally experiencing all the highs and lows of winning and losing around the world. There were the low level Futures events where prizemoney and crowds barely existed, all the way to Grand Slams with the chance to play with and against the famous names of the sport. There were also the team events ranging from Derbyshire to Dutch league to Davis Cup, with ties home and abroad for Great Britain. All brought the trials, the tribulations, the joys and the despair of playing when it really matters for yourself and for others.

The late 1980’s and 1990’s brought coaching years that stretched from the deserts of the Middle East in Dubai to working with Olympic teams at Seoul and Barcelona. There were international team competitions guiding young players just starting their tennis journeys on their first trips abroad to seasoned pros in the rarefied surroundings of The Royal Albert Hall, London for Wightman Cup or in the suffocating heat of Melbourne, Australia. 

As a brand new 21st Century started Andrew’s role in tennis switched to officiating. The player who had turned coach now turned referee and into a mysterious world that exists in the shadows of the tours. Sharing the same inner sanctums of dressing rooms and player lounges but now organising, listening, persuading and occasionally enforcing both the willing and the reluctant player along the way brought another new set of challenges in places from Assam, India to The Championships Referee at Wimbledon.  

Andrew loves his sporting life and it shows in his first work as an author in Championship Points. It gets to the heart of the reality of what it’s really like in the world of tennis. Seeing and sharing the inner workings of life on the tour and what it’s like to be in the minds of players who seek the glory but fear the shame of the next match it’s Andrew’s latest change of role within the tennis world. 

Away from the courts Andrew enjoys a nomadic life. Travel has always featured strongly over the decades and this continues as he spends time in his favourite places with his favourite people. With his wife Dannie he continues to explore the world but has special feelings for Panama, The Sunshine Coast in Queensland, The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, and a farm just outside Eindhoven in The Netherlands where his daughter Jazz lives. Lecturing about tennis on cruise ships has become a much-loved pastime that combines various passions and allows introductions to many wonderful people from totally different walks of life.

Home is sometimes a difficult concept when you are regularly moving on again. But the roots of Derbyshire and The Midlands and the lifetime friends that were made there remain as important now as they have ever been. Will he ever settle back there in the future? “Maybe one day……… but not just yet because there’s too much left to do!”

The Coaching Years

The Officiating Years

The U2/Iron Maiden wannabee rockstar years!