COURTING SCANDAL

Popular coach or predator? Aidan Turner will leave you guessing until the end of his new tennis thriller

He earned legions of fans as heart-throb Ross Poldark – who could forget that shirtless scything scene? – and now Aidan Turner is set to serve up another TV smash, this time as a charming tennis coach.

The Irish actor, 40, stars as Glenn Lapthorn in the new six-part drama, Fifteen-Love. While we’re used to seeing Aidan as the romantic lead in period piece Poldark, this tense thriller is set in the modern day and forced Aidan to brush up on his strokes and serves.

“I love tennis!” exclaims Aidan. “I’ve been playing a lot of it recently, before I even took the role, so I thought, ‘This is great, I’m going to have a really good summer playing tennis.’ But it’s a tough sport. I still find serving almost impossible. I think you need to be in the game a long time before you can really serve well. Only the pros on court could really nail it.

“It’s so hard if you’ve not done it as a child and have that muscle memory. I did ballroom and Latin American dancing for about 10 years from the age of eight to 18, and it’s something I can still do because I still have that physicality and know how to move my body. But if you’ve never done it, you’ll find it hard because it’s just not been in your body from a young age. It’s really hard to do a tango and look convincing if you haven’t got that muscle memory, and I think tennis is similar.”

Even though Aidan found mastering the sport a challenge, he and his co-stars had a very good teacher.