4 Garrison: More than just a tennis club
It may not be considered a talent-producing tennis academy, but 4 Garrison Officers Mess Tennis Club in Kumasi is turning out to be a model for its likes in the country.
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Made up largely of the youthful working class for purposes of beating off stress, the club has grown beyond the bounds of recreation into a serious outfit which has a national player in its rungs.
Francis Akpese, 19, who plays for the Golden Rackets, is one of a few youngsters who compete with the older generation, but a few others have benefitted from what started as a purely recreational grouping.
Joshua Duah, 17, is being sponsored through formal education by some senior members of the club, including club President Samuel Ampadu Kyei, while pursuing his cherished ambition to become a tennis star at the Winneba Sports College.
“We give our members more than just gathering to play tennis,” Mr Ampadu, , aka Kyikyiss, told Graphic Sports. “We provide a platform for exercising and networking.”
For the primary objective of the club, 67-year-old Adu Boakye remains the chief beneficiary of his membership, but having come through as an impressive player, the man who switched from squash to tennis said his current past-time and the club had become a part of his life.
Squash, he said, required a lot of stamina and movement, while tennis allowed for some thinking time. But the biggest benefit, he said, was the question of keeping fit.
Twin sisters Brenda and Bridget, who had trimmed nine kilos and five kilos, respectively, through playing tennis with the club, said playing the game with club members had become a life-changing activity that had brought them far more than their teenager looks even though they were near 30 years.
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And they both believe that Uncle Sam, as club members refer to Mr Boakye, was a marvel on the tennis court for a man of his age.
Without saying it, Uncle Sam has become a virtual ambassador for 4 Garrison Officers Mess Tennis Club where the mix of genders and generational gap are bridged by unrestrained camaraderie.
The membership of the club may be privileged to have him in their rungs, but he described the scenario as mutually beneficial to himself and the club because it was the club that provided the platform for training, keeping fit, socialisation and networking.
He may be different from the outgoing styles of the club’s self-styled strategist S.S. Abebe, club captain Kofi Otoo (Otoyo) or Roberto the organiser, but in the spirit of exercising to stay fit and living in harmony, even the playful twin sisters Brenda and Bridget concurred that “we share common values at 4 Garrison Officers Mess Tennis Club”.
When he recently played tennis in Wa, he had a significant inscription at the back of his playing shirt: Tennis is life. It could be the unwritten motto of 4 Garrison Officers Mess Tennis Club.