Competition is a great indication to see where you are really at with your Game

Competition and tournament play are so vital to any player trying to develop and improve their game.Juniors can get a false picture on where their game is really at from just attending coaching and playing fellow competitors from the same area or club ,Coaches should encourage their players they are working with to compete in tournaments on a regular basis not just locally but outside their area. Here both player and coach can get a true indication on how they are travelling with technique and match experience.From these matches a pathway on development and goals by player/coach can be set.

Congratulations to Tennis Southern for putting on the Southern Closed champs held in Timaru at the weekend.Some great matches were played and juniors that participated really benefited from the great weekend of Matchplay. It also helped no doubt Southern Selectors in determining southern team places for all junior National teams events to be held over January. South Canterbury players fared extremely well over the weekend and as Coach I was pleased with all participants.Many of our juniors new they had to step up this weekend and consolidate their form for selection and its pleasing to report many did.

Sam Lane won the boys 12s ,Annabel Ellis finished runner up in the girls 12s, Elliot Darling defeated Hamish Race in the boys 14s final ( an all South Canterbury match up) whilst Geraldine Prisk was defeated in the 14 Girls final. Hector Garcia Aquilar won the Mens Open from Dwayne Cleugh runner up and Andrew Van Rooyen in third place.All three players are pictured Dwayne left ,Hector centre and Andrew right. Cleugh in matches against Van Rooyen used his strong serve backed up by forehand to dominate thoughout against the South African.Against Aquilar Cleugh could not match the consistency off the ground as Aquilar won both encounters.Van Rooyen also found the going tough against the Mexican born player as Aquilar with heavy ground strokes and strong serving was able to win both matches in straight sets.
All results can be found on the results web site at this link.