A TALENTED tennis player from Shrewsbury will be bid a final farewell today.

Mike Woolven, 72, of Bomere Heath, died suddenly at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital.

Mr Woolven had a lifelong passion for sport. He was the Sussex under 16s junior tennis champion for 16 years and was ranked number three at under 18s in the UK.

He was educated at Queen’s College, Oxford, where he gained a degree in chemistry.

Mr Woolven was a member of the combined Oxford and Cambridge tennis team and his biggest highlight when he was at Oxford was being chosen to play in the Prentice Cup in the USA in 1960 and in the UK two years’ later.

The lawn tennis match was played over two years between a combined Oxford and Cambridge team and a combined Harvard and Yale team.

Mr Woolven started his working career with ICI as a plant manager. He became managing director and latterly chairman of Daniel Platt & Sons Ltd, a quarry tile manufacturer of Stoke-on-Trent, from where he retired in 1989 and moved to Shropshire.

He was a member of Oswestry Golf Club, an avid supporter of Shrewsbury Town FC and for the last 10 years had been a member of the Rotary Club of Shawbury and Mid Shropshire.

Before joining Rotary he was a long-standing member of the Lions Club both in Cheshire and Shropshire.

He is survived by his wife Helen, three daughters and seven grandchildren.

The funeral is at Shrewsbury Crematorium at noon followed by a gathering at Albrighton Hall Hotel.

Donations will be given to the Severn Hospice.