The paper reports that the LTA will deliver on its promise to sign up a `lead partner` today, whose identity will be revealed at the National Tennis Centre in Roehampton, southwest London. It is understood that the partner is a European financial institution and that its investment amounts to the best part of £30 million over four years, a sum worth about the same as the recent annual surpluses the LTA receives from its partnership with Wimbledon. The 2007 surplus was £25.1 million.
Announcing that it was seeking a ‘one size fits all’ partner, the LTA said: “The commercial programme has been designed so that they [the company] will be able to participate as the principal sponsor across a range of core properties”.
Those include the Artois Championships, the ATP Nottingham Open, WTA Eastbourne International Women’s Open, WTA Birmingham, the Great Britain Davis Cup and Fed Cup teams, Challenger and Futures tournaments and a wide spectrum below that.
