Imagine the business meeting where someone pitched the idea of Swingball…

“Guys, I’ve got a great idea for you which is going to make tennis slightly more dangerous and a lot less exercisey…. “

“Ok, I’m interested. Hit me with it.”

“Funny you should say that… We’re going to tie the tennis ball to a string and tie that string to a pole so that when you hit it, it swings around like a deadly wrecking ball. The idea is for the opponent to hit that ball back to the other player and avoid being whacked in the face.”

“So, they will be trying to deflect a projectile travelling at speed? Will they get to run around and avoid it?”

“Absolutely not, which is a great feature, the players get to stand completely still, not exerting much energy at all, and just deflect and return the tethered ball. Scoring can either be done by counting up the number of times the other player misses, or you could you add up how many bruises you inflicted. Either works.”

“I’m in.”

If anyone ever suggested “Hey, fancy a game of Swingball”, they might have well just said “Hey, I really want to inflict some pain on you under the disguise of playing a game.” This thing was deadly!

Of course you could have spent £15 on an official Swingball, or just nailed a ball on a string to the top of a broom handle and wedged that into the ground for a cheaper alternative.