The WhatsApp chase
Someone posts “Beat Dave 6-4 6-3” in the group. Then it scrolls past three conversations about court keys and a photo of a broken net. You fish it out on Tuesday night and type it into the spreadsheet.
Box leagues for tennis clubs
Run your tennis box leagues without the spreadsheet
Players enter their own scores. Their opponent confirms. The standings update themselves, and the Tuesday night you spent fishing results out of WhatsApp is yours again.
No card, no password · Your league is running in a few seconds
1234
| Player | DB | DM | FM | MJ | GP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| D. Byrne | 6-4 6-2 | 7-6(5) 6-3 | 7-6(5) 4-6 8-10 | 6-2 6-4 | |
| D. Martin | 4-6 2-6 | 3-6 4-6 | +1-6 3-6 | 6-4 3-6 7-10 | |
| F. Mortimer | 6-7(5) 3-6 | 6-3 6-4 | 6-1 6-4 | +6-3 7-5 | |
| M. Jackson | 6-7(5) 6-4 10-8 | +6-1 6-3 | 1-6 4-6 | 4-6 5-7 | |
| G. Poynter | 2-6 4-6 | 4-6 6-3 10-7 | +3-6 5-7 | 6-4 7-5 |
WinLost, won a set
LostAwaiting confirmation
The problem
What running a tennis league costs the person running it
The spreadsheet
One person has it. On one laptop. The formulas break when somebody plays a championship tiebreak. Nobody else can update it, and if they are away for a fortnight the league stops.
Promotion day
The season ends and the real job starts: work out who goes up, rule a new grid, type forty names in again. Then somebody asks why they went down and you go back through the sheet to find out.
Tennis · Padel · Squash · Badminton · Pickleball
How it works
Three things happen
You do five minutes of work at the start. Your players do the rest without being asked. The club just watches the table move.
Your players, every week
Two sets, a tiebreak, and the score is in before the next pair are on
A player taps the box link in the group chat and picks their name. There is no app to download and no password to forget, on whatever phone is in their kit bag.
Set scores go in as they come off court, tiebreak included, and the opponent confirms them. A score nobody has confirmed does not touch the table, so you never have to rule on who won.
Nobody confirms? It settles by itself after three days, unless your club sets a different number.
Box 2 · Two sets · Championship tiebreak
Jackson v Byrne
6
7
Tiebreak: loser's points
5optional
6
4
10
8
16 Jul 2026
i
D. Byrne has to confirm this.It won't count towards the table until they do, or until it confirms itself in three days.
M. Jackson beats D. Byrne
6-7(5) 6-4 [10-8]
32
Cancel
Save score
The table, all season
The box standings work themselves out
Each confirmed result moves the box straight away: points, bonus sets, head to head and set difference. Anyone with the link can read every box without signing in.
Nobody posts a photo of a spreadsheet on a Sunday night any more. The link is the table, and it is right whenever someone opens it.
Share sends the box table into the group chat whenever someone asks where they stand.
| No. | Player | P | W | L | BS | Pts | Games | Sets |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | D. Byrne | 4 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 11 | 48–33 | 7–2 |
| 2 | F. Mortimer | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 7 | 33–25 | 4–2 |
| 3 | G. Poynter | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 7 | 28–31 | 4–3 |
| 4 | M. Jackson | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 5 | 26–36 | 2–5 |
| 5 | D. Martin | 3 | 0 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 23–33 | 1–6 |
3 for a win · 2 for a loss having won a set · 1 for a loss with none won · 0 for a match nobody played.
5 players, 4 matches each, maximum 12.
Ranked on points, then the match between them, then set difference, then game difference, then matches won. Pending scores are not counted until confirmed.
That is the season
Set the boxes up in a few minutes, and when the season closes, check the draft of who goes up and down. The tennis in between is the only part that needs anyone.Two sets + championship tiebreak
Every way a club plays tennis
Pick the format when you create the season and every score is checked against what that format can actually produce. Nobody has to remember whether your league plays a third set or a match tiebreak, because the season already knows.
Seven formats, and one you write yourself
Two sets with a championship tiebreak, which is what most club leagues play. Best of three full sets. Best of three with a match tiebreak instead of a third. A single set. A pro set to eight. Fast4. Two sets with a tiebreak to seven. And if your league plays something that is on no list anywhere, the last line of the picker is Make your own: say how many sets, what they are played to and whether a two-point margin applies, and the sentence you build is what your format is called from then on.
Tiebreaks are checked, not trusted
7-6 asks for the tiebreak score and 7-5 does not. 6-4 6-4 is a finished match and 6-4 4-6 is not, so it asks for the decider. A set of 8-6 in a format that stops at 7 is refused. It is the same rule your league already plays to, applied before the score reaches the table.
Singles and doubles in one season
Boxes 1 to 4 singles, boxes 5 and 6 doubles, one season, one table each. A pair goes in as one entry: any of the four can put the score in, either opponent confirms it, and nobody has to be nominated to report for the pair.
Play everyone once, or twice
Five in a box playing everyone once is four matches over a season. Set the box to play everyone twice and it is eight, home and away kept apart on the same sheet, which is what a club with a long summer season usually wants.
The table your club already publishes
Three for a win, two for a losing set, one for turning up, or the graded table, or a point a set. Nine numbers behind “set them myself” if your league has its own. Change it mid-season and every table recalculates, because nothing is stored as a total.
Rain, injury and no court all season
A match nobody could arrange is a walkover. One that stopped at 4-2 in the third is a retirement. One the floodlights ended level is unfinished, and that one has no winner at all. Three honest outcomes, so nobody invents a 6-0 6-0 to tidy the table.
Ties broken the way your rules say
Level on points comes down to head to head, or sets, or games, in the order your league sets. The table says which rule separated two players and the rollover screen says it again in a sentence, so “why did he go up and not me” has an answer you can forward.
And the season leaves as a file
One button saves the whole season as a spreadsheet: a tab for every box, one with every result on it and one for the ladder. A row a match, both names, the score, the date. That is your club’s record, and it is yours whether you carry on paying us or not.
All year round
And a club ladder, between the seasons
Boxes give your club eight good weeks and then a gap. The ladder covers the rest of the year: one list, everybody in the club on it, and a rating beside every name that carries straight on from one season to the next.
Club tournaments
Tournaments, drawn to the regulations
The club championships beside the boxes: the draw made for you, seeded and byed the way the LTA publishes it, and a bracket that keeps itself.
On every paid plan. Seeds and byes follow the LTA Competition Regulations, the table your club’s rules page is a paraphrase of.
Why box leagues stall
A tennis box league that finishes, on the system that runs the club
Tennis clubs have software for nearly everything, and the box league is still usually a grid on one person’s laptop. What decides whether a league finishes is who does the work.
One system, not two
Clayside books courts and keeps the membership as well, with the box league on the same list of members. A new member is in the next box without anybody typing them in twice. Moving across is simple, one job at a time, and we help you do it.
A link, not an account
A box league finishes when playing it is easy. Here a player taps a link in the group chat and taps their name: no account to create, no number to look up, no password to forget. Their opponent confirms the score, so the organiser stops being the referee.
And the spreadsheet, still
Whatever else a club has bought, the box league is usually a grid on one person’s laptop with a screenshot in the group chat. That works until the person is away, the formulas meet a championship tiebreak, or they hand it over and nobody can open it.
Taking it to a meeting? The case for your committee is one page, written to be forwarded without editing.
Questions
What tennis clubs ask first
How do we set it up?
About five minutes. Make the league with the club’s name and an email address; there is no card to enter and no password to choose. The first time you sign in it walks you through the whole thing on practice data and then clears that out, so the only real thing you type is how many boxes you run, whether each is singles or doubles, and who is in them. Then you paste one link into each box’s group chat.
Can we run singles and doubles in the same season?
Yes, and most clubs do: boxes 1 to 4 singles, boxes 5 and 6 doubles. A pair is one entry in the box rather than two players, so any of the four can enter a score and either opponent confirms it. One person can play in a singles box and a doubles box at the same time.
How long should a tennis season be?
Three months, which for most clubs means a spring, summer and autumn season and a shorter winter one if you have floodlights. A box league runs on its deadline: it is the closing date that makes people ring round and book a court. Past three months the last few weeks are the same three people chasing each other.
What happens on promotion day?
Clayside drafts the next season out of the final table: top two up, bottom two down, or whatever numbers your rules use. Before you commit it it tells you what it spotted, including two players level at the promotion cut and which tie-break separated them. Move anyone you like, then press the button.
Do players need an app or an account?
Neither. They tap the link in the box’s group chat, tap their name, and they are in. No account, no password, and nothing to install. It works on whatever phone they already have, which matters when half a box would rather not be given a new app to learn.
We use ClubSpark now. How hard is it to move?
Not hard. Clayside books courts and keeps the membership as well, with the box leagues on the same list of members, so you can move one job at a time: the leagues first, then the court sheet and the subs before renewals. Your members come over from a spreadsheet and we help you through it. Every score is confirmed by the opponent, or by three days of silence, so nobody has to take anyone’s word for it.
Is it safe for our juniors?
Yes. In the boxes a junior is a name on a table and nothing more: no email address, no phone number, no date of birth and no account, because nothing is ever asked of them. If your club also keeps its register here, a junior never gets a sign-in of their own and their post goes to a parent. Safeguarding, written down.
What does it cost?
One box of up to 15 players is free, for as long as you want it: the live table, and the players putting their own scores in. After that every paid plan runs the same thing: as many boxes and seasons as you like, 8 club ladders, the championships, promotion and relegation, and career records. What you pay is set by how many members your club has. It starts at £120 a year or £12 a month, for a club of up to 125. Every paid plan carries a sponsor line on the league page, which is the one item here a club can turn straight back into money. See what is in each. The case for your committee. How the sponsor line works.
Have a look
Your next season does not have to run on a spreadsheet
No card, no password, nothing to install. Type your club’s name and where to email you, and your league is ready for its first season.
That table goes on your own club website too. Two lines to paste.