Sponsor Vodafone teamed up with The Lawn Tennis Association (The LTA) and The All England Lawn Tennis Club (The AELTC) to expand the 2023 iteration of the ‘Play Your Way To Wimbledon’ initiative to include disability categories and additional adult events as well as the original juniors strand enabling more tennis lovers to experience a once in a lifetime opportunity to immerse themselves in the Wimbledon experience
The telco backed national competition is the UK’s largest individual mass participation tennis competition and offers players a chance to compete on the world’s most famous courts – the grass courts at Wimbledon. The objective of ‘Play Your Way to Wimbledon’ is to inspire players to compete and to help to grow grassroots tennis across the UK. Indeed, the 2022 competition saw more than 10,000 playing opportunities across 700 venues.
The 2023 competition is open to a wider and more diverse group of players: including nine regional disability events (split between ‘visual impairment’, ‘learning disability’ and ‘wheelchair’ categories) acting as qualifying tournaments for the main contest. Plus, a new adult pathway offers doubles players an opportunity to compete at their local venue with winners moving forward to Area/National Finals.
While, like last year, junior players will again compete through ‘14-and-under singles’ and ’18-and-under doubles’ competitions across England, Scotland and Wales. Starting at local venue, the winners progress to County/Area Finals, with the winners and runners-up of these events advancing to the National Finals at the All England Club in August 2023 where they will be immersed in the full Wimbledon experience (from playing on the famous grass courts, using the facilities usually reserved for players competing in The Championships, as well as tours of the Grounds and Museum).
The promotional campaign, which launched in the first week of March, aimed to boost awareness of the expanded initiative and aims to drive entries via the online platform.
Developed in partnership with specialist sport and entertainment agency Fuse, the campaign spanned PR and social media with content running across Wimbledon, LTA and Vodafone platforms. The creative featured ‘Play Your Way To Wimbledon’ ambassadors and Grand Slam winning wheelchair stars Alfie Hewett and Gordon Reid
“The ambition of Play Your Way to Wimbledon is to provide all players, regardless of age, gender, background, ability or disability with the chance to take part in fun, local competition and win their way through to the Finals at Wimbledon,” outlined LTA Particpation Director Olly Scadgell. “Competition plays a key role in helping to retain people in the sport and with record numbers of people playing tennis we want to do all we can to provide accessible and inspirational opportunities for players to develop their enjoyment of the sport and keep them playing for years to come.”
“The expansion of Vodafone Play Your Way to Wimbledon reflects our ambition to make tennis more accessible to more people,” said Vodafone Chief Commercial Officer Max Taylor. “We’ll be working with our partners and Grand Slam winning ambassadors to encourage more participation across categories than ever before and we can’t wait to see the results.”
The AELTC (the UK’s tennis national governing body) Head of Professional Tennis and Tournament Director Jamie Baker said: “The expansion of this year’s competition marks a pivotal step in growing the pathways for emerging tennis players to play on grass – no matter their age or ability. Alongside the LTA and Vodafone, Wimbledon is proud to develop this competition further, ensuring it remains inclusive and accessible to all players across the UK. We look forward to welcoming participants to our AELTC venues for the National Finals later this Summer.”
Men’s wheelchair tennis world No1 and Vodafone ambassador Alfie Hewett commented: “It’s terrific to see the competition opening up to even more people in 2023 and including disability categories. For any tennis player out there, no matter what your background or age, everyone dreams of playing at Wimbledon, so it’s brilliant that we can help to make that a reality.”
22-time Grand Slam champion and fellow Vodafone ambassador Gordon Reid added: “Throughout my career, I have experienced many wonderful moments playing at Wimbledon. Inclusivity in tennis is something I’m incredibly passionate about, so it’s fantastic to see this year’s competition raising awareness of disability tennis and giving more people the opportunity to play on the world-famous courts.”
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The initial stages run from 1 March to 4 June, with Area/County Finals taking place in June and July and then National Finals played on Wimbledon’s Aorangi Courts in August.
The 2023 campaign follows on from last year’s ‘Play Your Way To Wimbledon’ marketing fronted by Emma Raducanu.
It was back in January 2022 that Vodafone penned a multi-year partnership with Wimbledon as the ‘Official Connectivity Partner of The Championships’ and of ‘The All England Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club’.
Some of its previous activations have included January 2022 and June 2022 iterations of ‘Feel The Connection’ and its 2022 ‘Wimbledon Experience W12’.
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