Tennis World in Middlesbrough hosted the 21st anniversary of the "Harry Thomas Memorial Tournament" earlier this week with over 60 children from 11 different schools taking part in the popular event.
The ‘Harry Thomas Memorial Tournament’ was as popular as ever for hearing impaired children this week with 62 children taking part in the mini tennis tournament.
The tournament, named “Harry Thomas Memorial Tournament”, in memory of Harry Thomas, a previous President of Durham & Cleveland LTA has become something more than just a tennis tournament. One of the schools explained the importance of the tournament, stating “Our children enjoy meeting and socialising with other hearing impaired children from schools in other areas, and they look forward to this day”.
The tournament ran throughout the morning, with the semi-finals and finals being played just after lunch. The children were divided into 11 groups and played round robin matches in their groups. On completion of their group matches we moved into knockout semi-final matches culminating in 4 finals, 10 & Under Boys & Girls and 11+ Boys & Girls.
Tournament finalists were:
Girls 10 & U - Lily Fairbank (St Johns) bt Georgia Simpson (George Washington) 7-6, 7-5
Girls 11+ - Megan Evans (Sandhill View) bt Scarlet Connelly (St Johns) 7-2, 7-0
Boys 10 & U – Macauley McIntyre (St Johns) bt Tyler McIntyre (St Johns) 7-1, 7-5
Boys 11+ - Spencer Rowe (Sandhill View) bt Thomas Chapman (Sandhill View) 7-5, 6-7, 7-5.
In the end St Johns School from Wetherby and Sand Hill View, Sunderland both went away with 2 winners. In addition to the tournament winners, trophies were presented “For Endeavour” to Tahreema Khatum , Kyle Barnett and Jake Roberts. The tournament was a great success and hopefully it will be for another 21 years!