A top International Tennis Federation official will arrive in Bermuda today for a weekend visit to see the island's facilities, meet coaches along with top junior players.

David Lambert, past president of the Bermuda Lawn Tennis Association, said this week the official, Anthony Jeremiah, is the "ITF Development Officer for the English Speaking Caribbean".

Lambert said: "Mr. Jeremiah will be meeting with our officials and coaches and players ? it is very important that the BLTA stay closely alligned with the ITF. We ask them for equipment and finances. He will also be meeting with school officials."

Jeremiah said: "Visiting all the nations in my region is very important for forming a relationship to develop tennis in the region and Bermuda."

Lambert added: "The ITF can advise us on many things. One of those is the competitions we can compete in our region. I want to discuss one of the problems we have here ? and that is often when an international competition is on, many of our best young players are away in school on tennis scholarships. What has happened before is that those schools may be involved with their conferences (playing matches) and will not release the players for, say, the Junior Fed Cup. That is understandable because the players are on scholarship. The BLTA have to make decisions on what to do ? do we send our second-tier players or wait until the next year. That is always a tough call to make because if we send our second team and get banged people may say 'what is going on in Bermuda?'

"We have a lot of questions we want to ask Mr. Jeremiah ? what can we do to make things better here? And they (the ITF) are always very good about sending back their recommendations."