Basingstoke Tennis

In January 2024 National Tennis took over tennis in Basingstoke from an operator that had run it for 31 years, under a ten-year concession with Basingstoke & Deane Borough Council. The partnership covers the Indoor Tennis Centre in War Memorial Park, with four indoor and four outdoor floodlit courts, the six floodlit courts at Stratton Park, and part of the John Arlott Pavilion, now home to our Park Social café.

Both venues now run as one Basingstoke Tennis offer, with the council investing in the buildings and courts and National Tennis running and growing everything that happens on them.

The council wanted an operator to run the centre and Stratton Park sustainably, keep courts open for the public to book, grow participation and bring the pavilion back into use for the whole park.

Much of the site was showing its age. The outdoor courts at War Memorial Park had been laid around 2000 and were past the end of their life, the pavilion needed rewiring and a new kitchen, and the indoor courts struggled with damp.

• One Basingstoke Tennis. Both venues on one booking website, with a club membership for regular players, a low-cost option for families, and courts always kept free for public booking.
• Coaching for every age. Youth and adult programmes expanded across the week, with holiday camps in every school break, including funded HAF places.
• Tennis for the whole community. Free tennis festivals, a schools roadshow with the LTA and School Games Organisers, Sport in Mind sessions, and amputee tennis with Blatchford and the charity STAND.
• A pavilion reborn as Park Social. The council funded Phase 1 of the John Arlott Pavilion refurbishment in 2024: a full rewire, new floors, a new kitchen and redecoration. National Tennis fitted out and equipped the café, which opened in November 2024 and now includes a tennis shop offering racket restringing and tennis and padel accessories.
• Investing in the courts together. The council resurfaced the four outdoor courts at War Memorial Park, an investment of over £50,000, and installed dehumidifiers on the indoor courts. SmartAccess entry is being installed next, and two padel courts are planned for 2027.
• More ways to play. Indoor pickleball, now across eight courts, sits alongside tennis, with its own membership.

Weekly coaching numbers have risen by more than 70% since handover, and club membership more than doubled in a year. The venues now welcome around 71,000 visits a year, with more than 7,000 court bookings.

Park Social has become a destination in its own right, with over half its customers coming from the park rather than the courts, and a tennis shop inside the café offering racket restringing and tennis and padel accessories. Our schools roadshow has reached more than 2,500 children across Basingstoke's primary schools, and hundreds of funded HAF holiday camp places have been filled.