It may only be a matter of bragging rights among companies but Commercial League tennis is really the fairy godmother of Bermuda's junior tennis.

As its 14th league season closes next week, president of the Bermuda Lawn Tennis Association (BLTA) David Lambert has lauded the contribution of the Commercial League, noting it has netted almost $150,000 for junior development in the sport.

"The reasoning behind Commercial League was to raise money for the development of junior tennis in Bermuda. Since its start more than $140,000 have been raised thanks to the corporate community and we're very fortunate," he said, explaining that businesses pay $500 for each team they enter in the summer competition plus there's additional sponsorship that boosts the coffers.

"It's very important. The BLTA has quite a few objectives for the development of our juniors and these funds are a tremendous help.

"Some of our most talented juniors cannot afford to travel overseas as often as we would like them to, some cannot afford private lessons or national training as often as we would like also.

"The money from Commercial League - in which 40 teams participated this year - goes into junior development and the BLTA then scrutinises the various needs and uses the funds accordingly to keep programmes running, to enhance them and to send juniors to tournaments and training camps overseas."

Lambert applauded the work done by the organising committee for the Commercial League, saying chairperson Alexia Poole and her team are doing a fantastic job.

"This is another success story within the infrastructure of tennis in Bermuda," said the tennis chief.

He also highlighted the role of the Winter League which just started its 34th season as the days have begun getting shorter.

"We don't hold many adult ranking tournaments during the winter because of daylight saving time. It's quite expensive to run a tournament under lights so that's one of the reasons we offer Winter League. So players can have organised tennis during the winter."

It attracts many of the Island's top players who, Lambert said, use it as a warm-up for Davis and Fed Cup competition.

"It started last week and they will play right through the winter until March or April. So our international players are using it for weekly practice."

Declaring there is "no off-season" for the sport, Lambert noted the Men's and Ladies' Ladder tournaments will also be up and running soon as well as Team Tennis for junior players. Such an active calendar, he added, augured well for the game in Bermuda and things already looked very promising for next year.

"It's a sport of all seasons - right through. It does not stop. This year was a very active year and 2004 - with the addition of junior Davis Cup and junior Fed Cup - is slated to be the busiest year in the BLTA's history.

"The only problem we had this year was during tournaments and with league competitions, we ran out of courts at certain times. We just didn't have enough courts in Bermuda.

"That's not such a bad problem - to have that many people that we're having a hard time finding a location.

"If you go anywhere in Bermuda at 6 p.m. you will find all the courts are booked. That's a good sign and I owe that success to all the different committees within the BLTA which are working very hard to offer all these programmes.

"We're very pleased to say there are thousands of people playing tennis in Bermuda in different programmes sanctioned by the BLTA."