Cheshire school Wilmslow High School finished 4th in the country after competing in the Glanvil Cup. Team captain Fiona Kelsall provides an insight into the teams performance;
Aegon Team Tennis Schools National Championships Finals 2013.
Tuesday 9th - Friday 12th July, Graves Tennis Centre, Sheffield.
Team - Sean Sivewright, Kieran Cronin, James Graham, Joppe Meulensteen, Matt Wheatley.
We arrived on tuesday and played against Repton in the sizzling heat!
Results : Joppe lost (but had a good game) James lost in a 3rd set tie break, Kieran won in a 3rd set tie break, Sean won. In the doubles Joppe and Kieran won, James and Sean won. Finishing 4 -2 up and moving into the last 8. ( a bit of a shock to Repton!)
Wednesday - a bit cooler for tennis and we played Cheam the number 2 seeds, who were expecting to beat us easily. Joppe and James both lost quite quickly but James in particular played extremely well against a very tall and strong 18 year old, ranked considerably higher than him. Kieran and Sean both played superbly to win their singles and draw the match 2 all. Our only chance to win one of the next matches was to change the pairings which resulted in a win for Sean and Kieran and a loss for James and Joppe. The outcome of the match is to play a tiebreak shoot out and the pair must comprise one player from the number 1 and 2 singles with one player from the number 3 and 4 singles. Kieran and Joppe played a very exciting and nerve racking tiebreak watched by a huge crowd and won!!!! I don't think any of us could believe we had reached the semi finals and the last 4 in the country.
Thursday - back to earth with a bump against Millfield, a very strong team who won all 4 of the singles matches. There was some very good tennis played particularly by James and Sean but we were truly outclassed. They conceded one of the doubles to us to protect a couple of players with injuries and Matt Wheatley played with Sean against their 1st pair providing an entertaining match to watch.
Friday - again a really hot day and the play off for 3rd and 4th place. Although we really wanted to win this, it was a big ask against a strong team from Bishop Stortford, 2 of whom looked at least 21. Joppe so nearly won his singles but eventually lost out on very close 3rd set tie break. James lost his singles and Sean was beaten by a very solid performance by their number 1. Kieran won his match so we were 3 - 1 down. Joppe and Kieran won their doubles, again on a match tiebreak but unfortunately their 1st pair were just too strong for James and Sean so the match ended 4 - 2.
We so exceeded our expectations and shocked quite a lot of the other schools with our performance. It was particularly special because in every match we played, our opponents whole team of players were all ranked considerably higher than our number 3, and on paper we were the definite underdogs.
Thank you to everyone for your support and lovely text messages.
Fiona.