THE mum of Grand Slam winners Andy and Jamie Murray has welcomed improved tennis facilities across East Lothian.

Judy Murray visited tennis courts in Musselburgh, Tranent, Haddington and Linton last Thursday and Friday as part of the Tennis on the Road programme, which is designed to encourage youngsters to get involved with the sport.

She spoke to the Courier at Tranent’s Polson Park last Friday evening and said: “The idea of Tennis on the Road is to take our van full of equipment into areas that either have no tennis or limited activity and are trying to really create a lot more activity.

“We try to help by building a workforce from people, who are volunteers of some sort.

“This is a parent and child session, so we’re in effect coaching the parents or helping the parents to help their kids. Then we hope that some of the parents might get keen enough to come down and help out at a local club or with junior coaching.

“I think in the slightly more remote areas where you do not have a lot of coaches you need a lot of volunteers to make things happen.” Earlier this year, Tennis on the Road visited Dunbar, Longniddry and Gullane.

Judy added: “The response has been fantastic. Stuart Brown, who is the tennis development officer for East Lothian Council, has been phenomenal at setting everything up for us and bringing the workforce in and bringing the kids in.

“What has been great for me is to come back to East Lothian and see new courts at East Linton, new courts in Tranent, new courts in Haddington and new courts in Musselburgh.

“That is fantastic and about 15 new courts in the area.

“So, you have a huge opportunity to grow the game.

“The facilities are one thing but it is the workforce you need to deliver it. The courts are fabulous, they are all public facilities so they are available to everybody and they are inexpensive, which is how it needs to be.” Mr Brown was delighted with the event’s success and thanked Judy and Kris Soutar, head coach at Tennis on the Road, for taking part. He added: “Tennis is a sport for all and we had a great age range on court during the visit, with the youngest just three and the oldest 88!

“East Lothian Council, Tennis Scotland and the local clubs have worked extremely hard over a number of years to get to this point of having these magnificent facilities in East Lothian.

“We have to take this opportunity now to grow our game through clubs, schools and through initiatives like Judy Murray’s Tennis on the Road.” However, it was not the only sport which had cropped up during her visit to the county.

Judy, who appeared on BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing, took part in an impromptu dance in East Linton.

She said: “There were some elderly gentlemen from the Sporting Memories club, who came and watched what we were doing. Two of them joined in a little bit, which was fun.

“One of them was quite a keen ballroom dancer, so he coerced me into doing a little bit of waltzing with him on the tennis court, which was quite fun.”