Joining Instructions for the day

You are registered for the East Midlands Doubles League on Saturday 21st February 2026 - 10am - 2pm, we look forward to welcoming you on the day. Please read through some important details of the event below.

1. Venue details, Directions and Car Parking: Colchester Sports Park, Cuckoo Farm Way, Colchester, CO4 5YX
2. Please familiarise yourself with the destination and route, especially if it's your first time. There is a large free car park at the venue, but you must register your car at reception to avoid a parking fine. Please do your research in advance and not on the day, it will really help you.
3. Timing: Starts 10:00am, finishes 2:00pm (Please arrive at 9:45am at the very latest for a briefing). You are very welcome to arrive earlier to ensure you warm up properly as injuries can and do occur if we don’t look after ourselves before we go on court.
4. Cancellation Policy: Any cancellations within 5 days of the event date will not be able to be refunded.
5. Last minute dropouts: In the event that you are unable to attend, please notify me soonest. We don't have many people on standby and because we have very precise court allocation and playing order, it means many adjustments will have to be made. This is not an invitation for you to cancel!
6. Check-in: Please make your way to the Sports Park Foyer/reception and make yourself known to Mark Watts.
7. Visitors: Visitors are allowed to attend this session but must remain in the viewing gallery and not courtside.
8. Format: More information on how the Doubles League format works, please see the Event Info tab above. Please note that both women and men are treated equal, you could end up being the only woman on a court of all men and equally you could end up being the only man on a court of all women. Your DUPR rating will determine your court allocation in the main. There will be 6 courts of 6 players each (30 players), you will play with and against everyone else on court, 10 games over roughly 4 hours.
9. Courts Allocation: We do our best to match people on court with similar ability mainly based on your DUPR Rating. We are unable to change players between courts on the day, as the playing sequence is predetermined ahead of the event and printed. There are many new players who have never attended previously or do NOT yet have a DUPR rating, a very warm welcome to all of you!
10. DUPR: All matches will be submitted to Pickleball England’s Club on DUPR.
11. Code of Conduct: Please find a link to Pickleball England’s Code of Conduct - please read it thoroughly and I will refer to it in the briefing before we commence play.
12. Match timing: We'll be playing to 11 (win by 1), if play is in danger of running over on some courts, we may request that the last few matches are played with rally scoring. We will notify each court if that is required.
13. Court Etiquette.
    1. Please remain near your court to ensure we don’t overcrowd the amount of people in each area.
    2. Please avoid hot drinks anywhere near the courts and only water is allowed to be taken onto courts. There is a water fountain to refill your bottles.
    3. Please can you ensure that you are wearing non-marking trainers/court shoes. Generally most players have invested in decent court shoes and even with black soles they should be fine, however a simple check on a white piece of paper on a hard floor at home and scraping the side of the sole on it, should confirm it.

If you have any questions at all, please, text, email or WhatsApp me (mobile below) and we look forward to welcoming you on Saturday 21st February, 2026, at around 9:45am hopefully earlier please!

Mark Watts

League Director

07867 548188

markusdwatts@yahoo.co.uk: