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17 May 2018 | Tennis ACT

Athlete Development Update

April saw Adelaide host the 12/u and 14/u National Grasscourt Championships. Well done to all the ACT players, led by coach Alun Jones,  who competed in the event including Charlie Camus, Sophie McDonald, Stelland Lindrud and Charlie Snow. All players had a great experience, with the outstanding result coming from Charlie Camus who reached the semifinals of the 12/u boys singles. Charlie then went on to have a successful April, reaching the final of the 12/u boys singles at the NSW Age Gold JT and winning the doubles, as well as taking out the 12/u boys singles title at the Newcastle Silver JT.

The Australian secondary schools championships, also known as the Pizzey Cup, was held in Brisbane in early May. ACT sent a strong team, which was led by Captains and No.1 players Jamieson Nathan on the boys side and Tallulah Farrow on the girls side. The team put in a highly competitive showing, taking rubbers off NSW, VIC, QLD and WA and defeating Tasmania comfortably. ACT took on SA in their final match which was a playoff for 5th position, with SA winning 10 rubbers to 8 in a nail biting match which saw the tie come down to the final match. In total, ACT won 32 rubbers and finished in 6th position. This was a massive improvement compared to 2017 when the team finished in last place and captured only 2 rubbers. A big thanks to team managers Diana and Chris Webster who put in a massive effort organising the team leading up to the event and  who also supervised and managed the athletes during the event in Brisbane and to Team ACT coach Todd Larkham who was also at the event.

In the individual singles tournament, known as the Tennis Australia cup, it was No.1 girls player Tallulah Farrow who had the best result, winning 4 matches before going down to Patricia Apisah in the semifinals. Whilst in the teams event, 15 year Ashleigh Simes was the standout, finishing with an amazing 11-1 win/loss record playing at the No.2 position. The ACT finished with 3 players selected in the merit team (best 8 boys and 8 girls over the events) and they were Tallulah Farrow, Ashleigh Simes and Jamieson Nathan.  Congratulations to all players who were selected and gave their all for Team ACT including Tallulah Farrow, Ashleigh Simes, Alyssa Simoncini, Nornaaah Sharma, Ellie Koundouris, Maddie Sutherland, Annika Wise, Callison Row, Jameson Nathan, Jack Tallarida-Lyons, Sam Bisa, Oliver Sheehan, Erik Chen, Damon Ilitch, Nick Bisa and Marius Van Rensburg.  More on the team’s Pizzey Cup experience available here

Whilst all this was happening in Australia, ACT player Annerly Poulos played a major part in the leading the Australian team to victory in the Junior Fed Cup Asia/Oceania Zone event. It has been a number of years since Australia has won this event, and the  team of Olivia Galecki (QLD), Annerly and Anastasia Berezov (NSW) were solid as a rock under pressure as they defeated all the best Asian countries to clinch the title. Annerly finished with an overall 7-1 win/loss record.  The team will now play the in the World Junior Fed Cup Finals to be held in the Czech Republic in August.  More details available here

Other notable results the past month:

Alyssa Simoncini – Winner 16/u girls singles Tasmania Championships

Ellie Koundouris – Semifinalist 14/u girls singles Tasmanian State Age

Ellie Koundouris/Alyssa Simoncini – Runner-up 18/u girls doubles Tasmania Championships

Jimmy Fu – Semifinals 16/u Boys Singles Bathurst JT

Chorlida and Sarina Kang – Runner–up Womens AMT doubles Bathurst AMT