Hampshire and IOW boys under 18 team were in group 3a which was played at Taunton Tennis Centre.
The team was: Liam Hignett, Jake Norris, Zizheng Jin, James Blair, Ryan Hutchinson, Ryan Golesworthy, Henry Bowden and Outek Dinapala.
The other counties in our group were: Lancashire, South Wales & Nottinghamshire.
Day 1 – Lancashire
First up for us was a tough match against Lancashire, we took some good wins in the singles from Jin and Ryan Golesworthy to take us to 2-4 with close 3 set losses for Liam and Jake. We could only win one of the doubles meaning we went down 3-6.
Day 2 – South Wales
Our next match was against a good team in South Wales, we started well with wins for Ryan Golesworthy, Outek, James and Liam to give us a good 4-2 lead but once again our doubles let us down and, despite having 4 match points in the 3rd doubles and going to the match tie break in the first pair, we failed to turn our chances into wins meaning we went down by 4-5.
Day 3 – Nottinghamshire
The final day was against Nottinghamshire who so far had failed to win a single rubber all weekend so we knew if we performed as we know we can getting a win should be on the cards.
A good performance by all the singles line up meant we raced to 6 -0 lead without dropping a set. This meant that we stayed in group 3. Being a young team means that all this year’s team will be available for selection next year giving us a great chance of progressing further in 12 month’s time.
Thanks to all the team for a great team spirit and an enjoyable weekend and thanks to my vice captain, Karim Aouichaoui, for his help over the weekend.
Mike Booth - Team Captain