tennis Fixture

Category D Open Championship (Level Singles for Handicaps 30-39) 2013

Results

Category D Championships 2013

In the 30-34 bracket, the top 2 seeds made it through to the final. Number one seed Jonathan Conway from Middlesex played home favourite Nick Brodie in the first semi-final. The first set was game for game all the way to 4-4 where Jon just managed to break the trend and take two tight games to take the first set 6-4. Jon got off to a very quick second set and went 3-0 up, losing only two points! Nick rallied but Jon took a couple of tight games to put the match out of Nick’s reach and completed a 6-4 6-2 victory.

Number 2 seed James Treweek then took on another home player, David Hudson. James got off to a flyer in both of the opening sets, taking an early lead before David dug in to close the gap. Nothing could separate them after an hour and 15 minutes, 1 set all, 6-4 4-6. James again got off to a flyer in the third, opening up a 3-0 margin in very quick time. This time he managed to not let David back in and managed to win 6-4 4-6 6-0.

Sadly James wasn’t able to recapture his earlier form in the first set of the final as Jon took complete control to take it 6-2 to James’ obvious frustration. The second set was much tighter as James was able to play a little more consistently and had some joy attacking Jon’s backhand corner and he even took a 5-3 lead and it looked as though we were heading for a decider. Jon though found a good length on his bobble and regained control taking a much deserved win 6/5.

In the 35-39 bracket,

The first semi-final was between Rupert Derham of Middlesex and Hatfield local David Barnes. This turned out to be a match dominated by serve with the first 10 points in set 1 and the first 16 points in set 2 all going to the server. It was little surprise then that Rupert who spent the vast majority of the time at the serving end ran out the winner 6/3 6/2

2 Hatfield members contested the other semi-final. Martin Richards and Andrew Barnes played out one for the purists with some hard hitting, and aggressive target hitting. In a match that ebbed and flowed in terms of control, the players found themselves at 6-2 2-6, 1 set all. It was Martin who got off to a good start in the 3^rd and opened up a lead which Andrew could not close allowing Martin to run out the winner 6-2 2-6 6-2 to set up a tie with Rupert in the final.

In the final, Martin started very positively and Rupert was making some unforced errors to help him along the way. It was 4-0 in no time, but then Rupert settled in and started to push Martin. Unfortunately for Rupert, the 4-0 deficit meant that it was just too tough and the first set ended up 6-3. Buoyed by his form at the end of the first set, Rupert started the second set very well, opening up a 3-0 lead. He had a game point for 4-0 but couldn’t quite take it, and Martin managed to pinch that game. That spurred the Hatfield member on and although the games were very tight, deuce in almost all of them, Martin was able to claw his way back into the set. Very close games just seemed to go martins way and he ran out a 6-3 6-4 winner.

Report by Jon Dawes