The Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) has partnered with Everyone Active to roll out touchtennis across the leisure centre operator’s facilities.

Touchtennis – a simplified version of tennis using smaller racquets, courts and softer balls – has been designed to lower the barriers to participation and will be made available at each of Everyone Active’s 20 sites.

The partnership will also see 60 Everyone Active staff being trained to coordinate family touchtennis activities and the company has also acquired specific equipment to deliver the sessions.

According to Chris Duncan, Everyone Active’s activities manager, the aim is to build on the recent British successes at Wimbledon and to introduce more people to tennis.

“We are eager to build on the growing popularity of tennis and interest in Wimbledon and get 2,000 people playing touchtennis over the first few weeks of the initiative,” he said.

“Hopefully this initiative will lead to increased participation in the sport across our sites.”

Alan Mezzetti, LTA products manager added: “We’re delighted to be supporting Everyone Active with touchtennis.

“With the game’s natural fit for indoor sports halls, Everyone Active is well placed to introduce large numbers to the game and their enthusiasm for engaging a host of audiences gives us real confidence that this will be the case.”

Everyone Active is the trading name for Sports Leisure Management (SLM), which operates 140 leisure facilities and cultural services in partnership with 40 different local authorities across the UK.