The February indoor Grade 3 tournament at David Lloyd in Long Ashton is now in its fourth year. During that time the numbers of entries have grown steadily. The Club prides itself in rarely turning down entries but this year a small number were placed on the reserve list, although ultimately almost all of those players finally managed to get in the draw.
Tennis Solutions organised the event with Donna Budd acting as tournament referee. During the event Donna was delighted to learn that she had received an upgrading of her Referees accreditation to R2. Assisting her were Karen Houselander, Sian Budd, Graham Budd and Lee Carwithen.
The tournament commenced with an Open event which was run as a compass draw giving all competitors the chance of an equal number of games. The draw contained a mixture of youth and experience but I suspect all the competitors regardless of age were feeling the effects by the time they had finished their fourth match. Julian page from Avon met Josh Gook (Hampshire) in the final but Josh was injured in his previous match and retired at 4 -1 down in in the opening set.
The Green Ball event ran over two days and was well attended with 14 Girls and 19 Boys. Erika Dodridge beat Lillian Mould in the girls final and Tom Batchelor overcame Joseph Leather in the boys final. The Orange and Red ball events were held on the Friday and with a bumper number of Orange ball entries there was precious little space for parents and competitors to watch. Orange ball events had separate draws for girls and boys but the Red ball event was a mixed tournament . Running these events is no mean feat particularly as there were qualification draws for the boys 9's. Sian and Lee took overall charge of these events and whilst it was a long day for some we were delighted that we had been able to accommodate almost all the competitors who had entered. Joseph Mccouobrie beat William Burridge in the 10's with Ouyoung Dinapala beating Maian Minnar in the boys 9's and Grace Piper beating Morgan Rixon in the girls 9's
The remaining age groups were played during the course of the week. The play back draw was a non compulsory event with a handful of matches played on the outside courts and fortunately the weather was very kind to us. As usual Donna took care to ensure that each of the events were not stretched over a longer period than was necessary. That being the case there was no set finals day which had the advantage of avoiding parents and players making extra journeys to and from the club. Details of the finalists in each of the age groups not mentioned above is shown below.
GS 18 Winner Isabella Brown Runner up Emma Lazic
BS 18 Winner James Griffin Runner up Paul Medley
GS 16 Winner Katarina Weymouth Runner up Emma Lazic
BS 16 Winner Giles Watterson Runner up Luke Stevenson
GS 14 Winner Emma Lazic Runner up Rafaela Mora
BS 14 Winner Ricky Hernandez Runner up Giles Hussey
GS 12 Winner Hannah Davies (Avon) Runner up Claudia Halls worth (Avon)
BS 12 Winner Harry Butler Runner up Declan Moran (Avon)
The standard of tennis was excellent and overall the week seemed to progress well.