Episode two of our quartet campaign, and (how shall I put this?) things take a slight turn from “creaky knees and committee politics” to “arson charges and incarceration.”
Welcome to The Courting Lives of an Ageing Tennis Player, where Nick Owen doubles down on the central proposition of the series: that the human mind, when cornered by mediocrity, will build itself a private Wimbledon and move in permanently.
Our man this time is Andrew Murray—a protagonist so devoted to the fantasy of sporting greatness that he upgrades himself into “Lord Andrew Murray”, an unreliable narrator with impeccable self-belief and absolutely catastrophic life management. In his telling, he’s collecting imaginary scalps at the majors, gliding through tournaments as if destiny has a wildcard with his name on it. In reality, he’s navigating a much less glamorous circuit: legal consequence, mental unravelling, relational wreckage… and prison.
The book plays this brilliantly in a picaresque, comic-surreal mode: big, swaggering inner monologues colliding with the hard surfaces of courts, cells, and consequences. And crucially, Andrew isn’t only witnessed through his own delusions. He is tracked. Documented. Observed.
Enter Phoebe, an amateur ornithologist who records “sightings” of Andrew like he’s some endangered and baffling species – rare, volatile, and liable to appear suddenly in the wrong habitat. And alongside her: Evelyn Williams, writing letters that try (and sometimes fail) to make emotional sense of a man who is both magnetic and impossible.
What you get, in short, is a sequel that turns the dial from midlife sporting fantasy into something darker and stranger: a pataphysical journey where imagined glory keeps trying to outrun the literal bars of reality—and keeps, inevitably, running straight into them.
So: laugh, wince, and keep your belongings close. Because in Courting Lives, the line between creative imagination and psychological collapse isn’t merely thin.
It’s… being called in by the authorities.
(Generated by JPS with a little help from Mork and Mindy)
In this first episode of our four-part podcast run, we plunge headfirst into Confessions of an Ageing Tennis Player – a satirical memoir that does something both noble and dangerous: it tells the truth about what happens when an adult with a stiff back and a fragile ego joins a tennis club and decides they are, fundamentally, one good warm-up away from Wimbledon.
Our protagonist is a middle-aged amateur, heroically over-invested in the game, attempting to navigate the twin horrors of club tennis:
being casually dismantled by teenagers who barely break a sweat, and
committee politics so petty they should come with their own line judges.
And yet — and this is the point — inside his head, the story is very different. There, he’s building a magnificent ascent: a private, cinematic campaign of destiny that ends, inevitably, with Wimbledon glory. The genius of the book is how it holds these two realities together: the creaky joints, unpaid subs and damp courts versus the fever-dream triumph of the imagined centre stage.
So yes: it’s funny. But it’s also oddly tender — a sharp little critique of the English sporting psyche and that classic Walter Mitty reflex, where fantasy becomes less a lie and more a life-raft. Because sometimes the only thing standing between you and total irrelevance is the voice in your head insisting, with absolute conviction:
“Next season… I’m going on a run.”
Julian Pilkington-Sterne, Acting Head of Sporting Delusion (Podcast Division)
(Audio file generated by JPS with some assistance from Mork and Mindy down in the locker room)
“I don’t like your attitude!” snaps “Serena Williams” as we square up over the club’s dubious grass courts. But I am “Andy Murray”, the greatest tennis GOAT ever, no really I am and you “Serena” are blocking me from my ultimate goal: chairman of our local club.
Mork Okay — have you ever been sitting on your couch watching professional sport on TV… the World Cup, maybe Wimbledon… and you get this creeping, totally irrational suspicion that if you just got up right now, you could actually compete?
Mindy: Oh, absolutely. Armchair-athlete syndrome.
Mork That specific feeling that, despite the creaking knees — and the fact you haven’t run a mile since high school — you could technically take a set off Roger Federer if the stars align.
Mindy: Yes. The Walter Mitty effect. You’re sitting there with a bag of chips, but in your head you’ve got the heart of a lion.
Mork: Usually, that fantasy dissolves the moment you actually stand up and your ankle pops.
Mindy: Usually. But today we’re diving into a source that doesn’t just explore that fantasy — it lives it, breathes it, and then painfully crash-lands it back into reality. We’re looking at Confessions of an Ageing Tennis Player by Nick Owen.
Mork: And what’s delightful is that it frames itself not just as a memoir, but as a… must-go guide.
Mindy: A guide — specifically for people who have failed. Failed to succeed on the tennis court… or, you know, anywhere else in life.
Mork: Which is, let’s be honest, a pretty large demographic. Most sports books are about optimisation, winning mindsets, glorious triumphs. This is… not that.
Mindy: It is not. The premise is fascinating: a narrator of a certain age — late middle age — who refuses to let go of childhood dreams. The book blends the mundane reality of local British club politics — committees, damp courts — with a fever dream of a journey where he somehow wins Wimbledon in 2013.
Mork: So our mission today is to unpack the psychology of this amateur player: the hilarity of the delusions, the sharp satire of British club culture, and ultimately why we lie to ourselves about our own athletic prowess.
Mindy: Sounds good. Let’s grab our rackets — preferably wooden ones — and get on court.
First set: the amateur reality
Mork: The book calls the first set “reality”: the amateur experience. And the narrator identifies a specific enemy straight away. Not weather. Not injury.
Mindy: Thirteen-year-olds.
Mork: It’s a conflict many recreational athletes will recognise. The text describes the shift from what he calls benign paternalismto sheer terror.
Mindy: Benign paternalism — I love that. As if he walks on court thinking he’s going to mentor them.
Mork: Exactly. He’s thinking: “I’ll teach this young lad about court-craft and respect and etiquette.” But the reality is brutal. The younger generation isn’t looking for a mentor.
Mindy: They’re looking for a straight-sets win so they can get back to their phones.
Mork: He describes them spinning rackets like cowboys with rifles. Intimidation. And the giggling — he really hates the giggling.
Mindy: Weaponised giggling. Nothing destroys the ego of a middle-aged man like a 13-year-old laughing while hitting a winner.
Mork: And there’s a deeper generational clash. He expects deference — instead he gets drop-shotted while panting on the baseline.
Mindy: That agony of the soft drop shot. It’s not even power. It’s humiliation.
Mork: But what’s fascinating is how he copes: the internal monologue. Physically he’s losing — but mentally he is somewhere else entirely.
Mindy: Key concept. He admits: when he’s playing, he isn’t just playing. He convinces himself he is Rafa Nadal. The grunt, the sneer… the regal Spanish wave.
Mork: Even while losing 6–0 to a teenager.
Mindy: Especially then. “Not only can I be Rafa… I am Rafa.” And then immediately double-faults into the net.
Mork: Tragic — and relatable. You hit one good shot and suddenly you’re looking around for the cameras.
Mork: He suggests the internal monologue is also a trap. It keeps you dreaming of signing autographs rather than doing the actual job: watching the ball.
Mindy: You’re mentally spending the prize money while forgetting to hit the yellow ball over the net.
Mork: Exactly. It makes you a worse player — maybe a happier person.
It is often quoted that it is in the first 100 days of a new regime when the newly appointed leader in charge has the narrowest of opportunities to prove themselves, set their stalls out and start laying down the law.
100 Days?
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