AN AUCTION house recently celebrated a successful October event as rare tennis sets were sold for thousands of pounds.

The Trevanion and Dean auction, held at the historic Edge Hall in Malpas saw bidders, both in the room and online, compete for Victorian Tennis sets for over £35,000.

The most sought after piece in the collection was a Sphairistike Lawn Tennis set which sold for £21,000 to a UK bidder competing against an American online bidder.

The creator of the set was Major Walton Clopton Wingfield, from Wrexham, who is responsible for inventing the game and revolutionising it.

Christina Trevanion, auctioneer and managing director of Trevanion and Dean, said: “The Sphairistike set has certainly been an exciting addition to our October auction.

“n the build up to the sale we have spoken to a great number of impassioned collectors who could not stress how rarely an original Sphairistike set comes up for auction and just how much of an impact that this game had on tennis as we know it.

“Moreover its creator, Major Walton Clopton Wingfield, hailed not too far from us in Wrexham, so in many ways it was as if the set was coming home.”

Prior to the Sphairstike’s invention, tennis was played on specialised indoor courts. Wingfield experimented with the idea of outdoor croquet lawns and secured a patent in 1874 for what he described as ‘new and improved’.

Christine added: “Major Wingfield achieved his ambition of restoring the noble game of tennis to its former glory, transforming a once strictly indoor game into the outdoor version we are so familiar with today.”