A female tennis coach told police officers that she could not have conducted an affair with a 13-year-old girl because she liked men, Liverpool Crown Court was told yesterday.

Claire Lyte, 29, who coached elite young British players, accused the teenager’s mother of making up the “bizarre” allegation after it appeared that her daughter would not make the grade as a professional.

She suggested in police interviews read out to the jury that the mother had been the driving force behind her daughter’s tennis career and that she invented the accusation out of spite.

In an interview with a detective constable, Ms Lyte said: “This has come out of malice that her daughter is not going to play tennis. I think her mum and sister may be jealous of the friendship I had with the girl.”

She was questioned about the allegation that she was caught by the teenager’s mother having oral sex with her daughter at their home in Merseyside almost a year earlier. She suggested that it did not happen.

When asked about her sexuality by Detective Constable Vinnie Howcroft, she replied: “I like men.”

Ms Lyte, who coached the student at the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) training academy at Loughborough, said: “These allegations have come out of me having a conversation with the mother about her daughter’s tennis career. I told [the girl’s mother] that she was not progressing as well as we had hoped and she seemed to think I was trying to force her out of the academy. I find it bizarre that she is coming out with this now that her daughter has stopped playing tennis.”

Ms Lyte told the officer that she had long been unsure about the girl’s motivation.

“Her mum said she wants it but I am not sure,” she told the officer. “I do not want to see her play tennis if her heart is not in it. She is a bright young girl who can do something else. I think her mum wants it more. Sometimes I feel she has been forced into it.”

The jury was told that Ms Lyte was seen around the campus with her young charge, and that they were observed sharing a toilet cubicle. But Ms Lyte denied treating the teenager, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, any differently from her other pupils.

She told the jury: “The LTA has strict guidelines so that something like going for a sandwich with a girl at lunchtime was frowned upon.”

Joanne Skinner, the academy administrator, said that her office overlooked the entrance to the staff toilet. She saw the teenager follow Ms Lyte into the toilets on a “couple of occasions”.

She said: “They would stay in there for a few minutes and they would come out together.”

Ms Skinner said that she spotted the pair on four or five occasions off-site or around the university campus in places where they thought people would not see them. She also said that Ms Lyte would pop into the students’ study room two or three times a day.

Helen Reesby, a fellow coach, said that Ms Lyte and the girl were considered to be spending a lot of time together. She believed that the coach was putting herself in a compromising position.

At the request of Judge Nigel Gilmour, QC, Ms Reesby was shown text messages sent by the girl to Ms Lyte’s mobile phone suggesting a close friendship.

The judge asked her: “Suppose it was one of your players and suppose these texts were unwelcome; what would you do?”

Ms Reesby replied: “I would have immediately gone to my bosses. From a self-protection point of view I would have tried to get away from the child. I would not have wanted to be in that situation.”

Ms Lyte, of Shirley, near Solihull, West Midlands, denies five counts of unlawful sexual activity between May 2005 and June last year.

The trial continues.

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