News

Mar 10, 2017

Women’s Chelsea Cup 10^th March - Round 5 vs Beach Haven

Round 6 of the Women’s Chelsea Cup competition against Beach Haven was moved to Albany Tennis Centre’s indoor courts owing to the atrocious weather.  During the evening the rain lashed down at times so heavily on to the centre’s roof that the noise was literally deafening! We started the round off with the doubles contest. Our top pairing of Sarah Weekley and Victoria Hartland played a very close match against Beach Haven’s Brooke Kenny and Lauren Fleming. Despite every best effort Sarah and Victoria couldn’t pull off a win and went down 6-4 6-3. Our second doubles pairing of Lara McNaughten and Trixie Muller Leiendeder played against Lana Popovich and Eliza Clamor. Lara and Trixie got off to a very strong start winning the first set 6-1.  Beach Haven put up an incredible fight in the second set taking it to a tie break at 6 games all.  Lara and Trixie kept their heads winning the tie break 7-4 with a fabulous back hand down the line from Lara to finally win the match 6-1 7-6.

Our top singles player of the night Sarah Weekley played against Brooke Kenny.  Their last encounter saw Sarah win comfortably but on this occasion Brooke played the stronger game defeating Sarah 7-5 6-3.  Our number 2 singles player Lara McNaughten was drawn against Beach Haven’s Lana Popovich. This was an incredibly hard fought match with some very long rallies. Both players forced each other to fight for every single point. Lara did everything possible to try to win the second set and saved 4 or 5 match points but finally went down 6-3 6-4. Our number 3 Miranda Yuan played Lauren Fleming. Once again Miranda was victorious against a much more experienced player winning the match 7-6 6-1. Our number 4 player Trixie Muller Leiendeder played a fantastic three setter against Eliza Clamor. Trixie (despite not having played a singles match in ages) managed to pull off a 6-4 5-7 6-3 win.  The evening finished in a tie at 3 matches all.  On count back Beach Haven were declared the winners by one set.

Men’s Chelsea Cup 10^th March - Round 5 vs Beach Haven

“Doubly Delicious” is what comes to mind when we recollect the intense thunderstorm we had against Beach Haven. It all went down to the wire with the two doubles matches. We were 3 – 1 down after the singles and needed to strike back hard with two set victories in the doubles to ensure that there was no chance of a set-all count back tie, as we had an extra set floating in the balance from the singles. Adam Thompson managed to clinch a set in his 6-7, 6-1, 10-8 (5) loss to Alex Klintcharov. At just 20 years of age Klintcharov has recently been ranked as high as 1582 in the world. All said a special acknowledgement needs to go for Mark Nielsen’s outstanding performance in this year’s Chelsea Cup. He is now undefeated in all 5 singles matches and still plays like a pro and wins like a pro!!!

Adam and Mark finished their doubles first with a tightly fought battle against Tim Heslin and Ishan Naik winning 6-3, 7-5. The Fanguna Bros were left with the graveyard shift with simple orders, “bury your dead”. And deliver they did.. in spade-fulls with a 6-2, 6-4 win. Their doubles duo is always made up of brut force and uncanny touch. Not many players can pull off a volley lob when they are having a close quarters dog fight. You have to see it to believe it!

And yes, they bring it every time this Friday Night (17^th March) will be no exception the men play Mairangi Bay at home. Play starts 6:30pm.