At the Victorian Tennis Community Awards on May 22, Oakleigh Tennis Club won the prestigious "Most Outstanding Club or Centre" award.

This has capped off an amazing recent period for Oakleigh Tennis Club, winning the following awards:

• Tennis Victoria's Coaching Excellence Award (Club or Centre) - 2022/23 - Tina Keown (OTC Head Coach).
• Newcombe Medal - Tennis Australia's Coaching Excellence Award (Club or Centre) - 2022/23 - Tina Keown (OTC Head Coach).
• Tennis Australia's #1 Book-A-Court venue for 2024 (more court hours booked than any other venue in Australia).
• Waverley District Tennis Association's Premier Club Award - Summer 2024/25 Competition Season - for the highest average ladder position (3.37692) of our 20 junior and 6 senior teams.
• Tennis Victoria's Most Outstanding Club or Centre Award - 2024/25.

Video of the announcement and presentation can be viewed at:

https://vimeo.com/event/5128124/b60a2fcf4d

Our award section starts at 1 hour 22 minutes 40 seconds.

In accepting the award on behalf of the club, Donald Smith (President) stated:

"Thank you to Tennis Victoria for all your support and for putting on these awards, and congratulations to all the nominees and winners tonight.

Oakleigh Tennis Club has had a wonderful history, dating back to 1879.

Our longevity has been due to generations of hard-working volunteers and more recently, the fantastic relationships between successive committees and coaching teams, who are the lifeblood of any club.

There have been 29 Life Members of our club, highlighting the long-term dedication of so many volunteers during our 146-year history, without which we would not still be here today.

I would like to pay special tribute to David McNamara, who came to the club in 1993 when we had no coach, no members playing competition and no active juniors. 

Not only did David save the club from closing, but over the next 26 years he and his coaching family helped the club to grow and thrive until his retirement in 2019. 

The handover to our new coaches from the Victorian Tennis Academy, wonderfully lead by Tina Keown, coming on board at the same time as North Oakleigh Tennis Club merged with us and we relocated to our new Caloola Reserve facility, saw massive simultaneous changes for the club to adapt to, but it couldn’t have been a smoother transition, thanks to the good will, collaborative spirit, willingness to embrace change and hard work of everyone involved.

A big part of our success has been that the committee and the coaches are always working in each other’s best interests and to maximise participation.  As a result, we have both prospered by more than the sum of our parts, and everyone at the club has benefitted. 

Typically, it was our head coach, Tina Keown, who suggested the club should nominate for this award.

And finally, if I might just mention, we LOVE the Book-A-Court system because it has given us a healthy and reliable revenue stream, and has also helped to drive our massive growth in membership."