Season Home Opener for the new Washington Kastles with Serena Williams

Tuesday evening marked the Season Home Opener for the Washington Kastles of World TeamTennis against the Boston Lobsters.   The match was totally sold out. Serena Williams, fresh off the plane from Wimbledon, was there as a "guest player" for the Kastles. 

(Pictured above: Team owner Mark Ein with Mayor Adrian Fenty; below, The Billie Jean King, Founder of WTT)

The most interesting aspect of the WTT rules, is that fans in the stadium "are encouraged to be loud and cheer for their team".  To that point, there was actually a guy with a mic running through the crowd (similar to that of basketball and baseball games) to get them riled up and rowdy.  It was quite unsettling to be at a tennis match where people were yelling, talking, clapping and doing whatever else you would do at any sports venue other than tennis.  However odd, it was a lot of fun.

The Kastles pulled out all the stops and produced a lot of fanfare for their guests last night.  With only a two week season and a stadium which only holds 2000 people, you are pretty much guaranteed a good seat if you hurry up and purchase a ticket.  There really are no bad seats in the house. 

The Dream Tables include a four top, seated dinner with servers, and loads of sponsor paraphernalia (for a mere $4,000 for all the matches).  You also get to hob nob, move from table to table and network.  Not surprising, they sold out very quickly.

Seats are very inexpensive and since the stadium is literally right downtown, you can grab dinner or drinks before or afterwards quite easily.  The next match is Friday the 11th, then McEnroe comes to play on the 15th.  There are matches on the 17th, 20th, 22nd and the closing home match is with Anna Kournikova on the 23rd. For more information and to purchase tickets, please go to www.washingtonkastles.com. 

(Pictured above: Gossip Lady Roxanne Roberts getting scoop from Jean-Marie and Raul Fernandez; below left: Serena takes on the Lobsters and right: Is that a human tennis ball?  Why yes, it is. The team is greeted with major fanfare.)