Courts across the country are re-opening, and for countless it’s not a moment too soon

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There are some rackets you don’t know you’re nostalgic for until you hear them. The thwack of a well made tennis ball has been missing from this British outpouring. It is amazingly cheering, on a colors Saturday morning, to hear it return. By nine o’clock yesterday, the first weekend of continue since lockdown began two months ago, the 14 tribunals at Coolhurst Tennis Club in Crouch End in north London were full.

Among the early starters was David Berry, whose journal A People’s History of Tennis is published this week. Berry talks of the relief of getting back, though a few things have changed. “What our bodies aren’t used to is playing singles, ” he says- double-dealings is still not possible with social distancing. “My best friend Adam and I have played a mixed doubleds every week for about the last 25 times. I had a Zoom conversation with two of the status of women we play with and they were going up the wall not being on field. It actually changes people. It is the combination of that physical game you enjoy and then getting together for a glas and a gossip.”

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Read more: theguardian.com