Girls U16 Team Tennis Finals – NTC Roehampton

22^nd -24^th July 2011

Captain's Report

Well, after a series of matches around the South East Region the weekend had finally arrived!

To get to this point, we had played against and beaten WimX Connaught, Gosling and Chandos LTC, it had all started in April and finished in June.

Special thanks must go to Daisy Hugkulstone (Bromley Tennis Academy/The Parklangley Club) and Sophia Thomas (Bromley Tennis Academy/Orpington Tennis Centre) who were our Super Subs in these qualifying rounds.

So the finals arrived, we met up on the Friday and the girls arrived at the NTC from all over the region having completed their respective tournaments.  Resplendent in their black and pink 'dayglo' T shirts, BTA  hoodies and they were ready to go. Our court surface for the weekend was red clay under a canopy, the girls had to make the decision between making sandcastles on the baseline from the surplus clay or playing tennis on it, luckily for us they decided to play tennis.

Our team – Mark Hayden – super coach.

Ellie Murphy (Bromley Tennis Academy)

Anouska Newman (Bromley Tennis Academy/Jarrett Tennis School/ Sevenoaks LTC)

Gaby Paul (Bromley Tennis Academy/ LA Fitness)

Sarah Wray (Bromley Tennis Academy/The Parklangley Club)

Sophie Jenner (Bromley Tennis Academy/Jarrett Tennis School)

On Saturday morning, we released Ellie from her room – how the lock became stuck we don't know! - a theme was developing.... and made our way to the NTC . As first seeds, our opponents were Notts. The format was that we had one court and one match went on at a time. The fourth singles player went first then the third and so on until the two doubles matches. A long day for Mark who sat on the bench and alternated between freezing and performing strange warm up dances, (from 9am until 5pm!).

Gaby played first and won, this was a good start and all of the girls then went on to win their singles in style. Gaby and Sarah won their doubles. Sophie and Anouska narrowly missed out on their match vs the Notts first pair. However, a 10-2 start was brilliant and the girls tucked into their healthy NTC dinner (during which we released Gaby from the canteen toilets …........ 'Hey guys the door's stuck!!')  ready for the match against West Hants on Sunday.

We knew that this would be a tough day, Mark earned his Healthy Snacks!  After a Healthy NTC breakfast the girls were ready. We changed the order of players and Gaby and Sarah switched places. Sarah played first and unfortunately lost out to the West Hants number 4. Gaby then went on and went down in the first set 2-6. It all went quiet in Camp Bromley but then the girls, mums and dads cranked up their awesome support, Mark imparted his magic words and Gaby came out in the second set all guns blazing. She took the set 6-0 then won the tie break 11-9.

Game on!  2 points all.  Anouska carried on the momentum with relentless accuracy and won 6-1 6-2. 4-2 to Bromley! However, all was to become tense again as the West Hants number 1 managed to take the last singles match. 4 points all. Another Healthy NTC lunch was needed.

 It all went down to the doubles- Gaby and Sarah (in matching outfits, of course) played a storming doubles and took that round  6-3 6-1. So we just needed the last doubles …. but it was not to be... the West Hants pair just managed to sneak the last round 4-6 6-7 !

Shoot Out!

World Cup penalty time sprang to mind as the girls all stepped forward willing to take it on. The choice was made; Anouska and Sarah would be the brave pair. They made a great start, 4-0 up. The other pair pulled back to 4 all. The girls forged ahead again 8 – 4, West Hants pushed up  9 – 8 to them. At this point everyone was either not looking or were peeping through their fingers. After a fantastic display of bravery and positive tennis, the girls took the next 2 points and won the match! (This last point has been captured on shaky movie and is on the LTA link to the finals along with a few other match points.)

Well done girls!!  And a special Well Done and Thank you to Mark for his commitment and Wise Words which were totally appreciated by the players and parents. Well Done too to West Heath U12 girls who won their age group in another exciting shoot out. Hooray for Kent!

Liz Bennett