On the 12th October, the annual Mark Wormleighton event was played at Loughborough University. This is a 12 and under event that has been running since 1978. Those invited this year were Louie Fletcher, Oscar Holmes, Aaron Jinks, Krishnan Jivanji Victor Wiles, Theo Woolhouse-Lorber, and Harry Worrad; Rachel Astill, Prianka Dhokia, Erin O’Boyle, Daniella Page, Emilia Parker, Eleanor Shaw, Anisha Sood, and Abigail Wilkin.
The boys started proceedings and there was an excellent first round match between Louie Fletcher and Theo Woolhouse-Lorber, with Louie winning the match after edging ahead in a very tight first set and then kept the momentum to run away with the second. All credit to Theo for putting up such a good fight. Louie’s second round match was against Oscar Holmes who proved to be too strong, but it was a solid performance from both. On the other side of the draw, Aaron Jinks had a straight forward first round match and then had a bigger challenge in round 2 playing Victor Wiles. Aaron went on to face Oscar in the final. It was a fantastic match with Aaron edging ahead and winning 4-2, 4-2.
The girls’ draw saw a great performance from Erin O’Boyle when she knocked out the number 2 seed, Abigail Wilkin. Erin, then went onto to lose to Anisha Sood who played a fantastic final against Eleanor Shaw. Anisha took the first set, but Eleanor levelled the match and went on to win the third set match tie break, 10-7. Special mention should also be made to Rachel Astill who lost a very close first round match against Anisha and then went on to win the consolation draw.
Overall, there was a great standard of tennis throughout the day making me feel confident that the future of tennis in Leicestershire looks bright! Well done to all who played.
Full results can be found on the LTA website under the tournament code LEI14W6378.