Whether you call him Coachie, or Coach, it doesn’t matter, his face just brightens up, and no matter how many times you call him, Patrick Oche is ever ready to respond.
This was the experience Nigeria Tennis Live correspondent had when he paid an unscheduled visit to the LKJ Tennis Club in Igando, Alimosho area of Lagos State.
Despite having only one tennis court, a standard court, the interest from the kids and the adults on the court proved that the Coach must have been doing something unusual inside the LKJ Gardens residence.
And one would be more surprised to hear and know that this coach has barely spent a year with this set of players, yet, he oozes the class and is highly respected by his players.
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With the number of kids he has to cater to per time, and he said they could have been more than that on a normal day, it is not totally normal for him to lose his temper from time to time.
However, he attended to each of the kids patiently and according to the peculiarity of their needs, demands and otherwise.
During the conversation with Nigeria Tennis Live, Coach Patrick revealed that he was formerly at the Diamond Tennis Club, where he used to train kids on how to play tennis since playing tennis is something he really enjoys doing.
“I came to Lagos from Kaduna about two years, to start work here, because I am an architect by profession. But I found myself taking keen interest in tennis coaching after seeing the facilities around.
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“Actually, they were not of the best standard at the time, but we rallied and worked on the facility to bring it up to the level that would allow for proper tennis, and that’s how it is till now,” the lanky coach stated.
For someone who shows that much dedication to his players, one would expect that Coach Patrick was earning his paycheck, but his response to whether or not he is being paid was even more shocking.
He said: “Most of the things I do, I do because of the passion and love I have for tennis, if not, I would have stopped long before now.
“And the reason is that I don’t get paid for doing this. I just put in all my efforts into ensuring that these kids learn to play tennis and their consistency keeps me going.
“Also, when I see their level of growth, where we started from and where we are today, I feel extremely excited and grateful for how they are growing, and this further motivates me to want to do more.
“Some of them have complained of not having rackets to train, and you know how expensive a sport tennis can be… I have had to sort some of the items the players train with myself, just because of my passion and love for the game.”
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Now that Coach Patrick has seen the lacuna in his immediate environment, he is collaborating with other tennis enthusiasts to bring succor to some of these youngsters.
According to him: “there is a project we are working on at the moment, we are still cooking it but we intend to make it public soon enough.
“It is an attempt at helping kids who do not have to tennis kits. We are working on taking tennis to schools, we want to partner with schools, and introduce tennis to a lot more kids.
“Hopefully, in the coming months, we will be able to share most of these things with the public and help a lot of children who are not in the space to get the items they need for their tennis production”.
Nigeria Tennis Live will keep monitoring the activities of Coach Patrick at the LKJ Tennis Club and Diamond Estate both in Igando area of Lagos State.
2 Comments
True, he has been a major influence to the tennis development in and around alimosho during the short span of time he’s been around.
He’s someone to watch out for and give all necessary support that he needs to push the sport in the grassroots.
Thumbs up to him.
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