It was good to see new faces in the singles events at the Bromley Tennis Centre. Mick Bull from Horsmonden was first up facing holder John Watton in the 45’s and acquitted himself very creditably in a 6-3 6-4 scoreline in John’s favour. In the 55’s Tony Ferdinando from Wendover and HSBC had to give way to Bob Whitehead’s experience but will be much the wiser next year. In the 65’s Sir Keith Ajegbo proved too steady for Keith Clark but the scoreline did not do justice to some lengthy rallies (is Keith our first knighted champion?) Bob Whitehead retained his 60 singles title but a much improved Peter Pharo gave him a much closer fight than last year pushing Bob to the limit in the first set. Bob Milner overcame Stephen Woodley in the 70 singles showing remarkable recovery from a recent hip operation. The best game of the day saw last year’s 45 doubles champions Simon Gent and Colin Coombes take on Peter Elsden and Dominic Wood. In a high quality contest the holders were dominant in the first set but Peter and Dominic found a way through to take the net and the next two sets. In the 55 doubles Nick Ng and Arun Vethakkan got the better of last year’s runners up Chris Mackenzie and David Willan from Parklangley and the 60 doubles was unfortunately halted in the third set due to injury, the trophy going to the Andrew/Garratt combination. Playing the last match after organising proved a step too far for Colin Dancey and he and Vic Chance went down to holders Keith Clark and Gary Sims. Keith made amends for his earlier singles defeat with some devastating forehands from the back of the court and some unbelievable lobs from the same position! Earlier holders Denis Costelloe and Derek Taylor proved too strong for Gravesham’s Graham Russell and Phil Pretty.
Throughout the day the absence of a complete strip of lights on court 2 proved a disappointing problem for competitors and it is to be hoped that this will be resolved quickly by the new centre management team.